One of the two Hill Middle School assistant principals will return in the upcoming school year.
The contract for Patty Brand was renewed Monday by the school board along with the one-year contracts for all administrators in Indian Prairie School District 204.
The other assistant principal, Jeff Haeger, resigned in March.
Both came under fire last year for how they handled a knife incident at their Naperville middle school.
In the April 8, 2015, incident, students reported that a boy brought a knife onto the grounds of Hill Middle School before the start of the school day.
The student, then a fifth-grader at nearby Brookdale Elementary, pleaded guilty in January to bringing a knife to school. He was convicted of a Class A misdemeanor charge of aggravated assault and sentenced to court supervision in March.
The assistant principals were censured last year for interviewing and searching the backpack of the Brookdale student without permission from the district’s central office and imposing their presence at another school.
Although the incident happened in April, the issue came to a head in early May when parents turned to social media for information. They accused District 204 of failing to be more upfront with parents when the incident occurred and when charges were issued.
Also fearing the principals might lose their jobs over the incident, more than 200 people signed a petition in support of Brand and Haeger and urging the school board to renew their administrator contracts.
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