Harvest Park, Pleasanton Middle schools have new principals in district’s administrators shuffle

Harvest Park and Pleasanton Middle schools have new school leaders as a result of Pleasanton school district administrative changes.

Former Harvest Park interim principal Jill Butler started as Pleasanton Middle School’s principal Monday after its principal, Aileen Parsons, accepted a job as the district’s director of human resources, said interim superintendent Jim Hansen.

He said the arrangement of having two co-principals is expected to last until the end of the school year.

Butler previously was vice principal at PMS and also was the chair of the school’s Language Arts Department and a classroom teacher.

Harvest Park will now have two co-principals, Amy Theberge and Steve Maher, and they will share duties and will alternate working days.

Theberge has experience as principal of Alisal Elementary and Donlon Elementary, a TVTIP coach and a classroom teacher. She earned her bachelor’s from Cal State Chico, her master’s in interdisciplinary education with a literary emphasis from Santa Clara University and her multiple-subject credential from Santa Clara University

Maher, a longtime Pleasanton Unified educator, was a teacher from 1971 to 1979 and was an administrator at several schools, including principal at Hart Middle School.

Theberge will work Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and Maher will work Thursday and Friday, Hansen said.

Parsons, an educator for 17 years, was selected as director of human resources after Mark McCoy, the previous director, took a job as Dublin Unified School District’s assistant superintendent of human resources in October. McCoy had been at Pleasanton Unified for 19 years before taking the new job, which is the top post for human resources in that district.