Brownell Middle School will welcome a new principal next year,
longtime Gilroy educator Greg Camacho-Light.
Even though Greg Camacho-Light is still settling in to his new office at Brownell Middle School, he makes a point to prop the door open despite the clutter.
“The door is open,” the new principal said. “Come on in.”
When the position at Brownell opened up, Camacho-Light, 54, jumped in head first, wrapping up his duties as assistant principal at Ascencion Solorsano Middle School and working to make the shift to Brownell as seamless as possible. Brownell’s eighth graders have seen three principals in the three years they’ve been at the middle school and Camacho-Light makes four in as many years. With the help of newly appointed assistant principal Kristen Shouse, he will provide the stability Brownell needs, Superintendent Deborah Flores said.
“I’m very excited about this team,” Flores said. “Their commitment to Brownell is obvious and will be long term. That’s what Brownell needs.”
Camacho-Light and Shouse couldn’t agree more, they said, and are in it for the long haul. A high correlation exists between student success and a stable learning environment, Flores said.
Former principal Francisco Fuentes recently resigned and moved back to Arizona for unforeseen personal issues, he wrote in a letter to his students and their parents. He will fill a position as a high school principal closer to home, he said.
“I hope you find it in your heart to understand that this is a positive opportunity for both my family and my career,” he wrote. “It truly has been a joy and a pleasure to have worked with all of Brownell’s students and families.”
The challenge to raise test scores and stabilize Brownell is now on Camacho-Light’s shoulders. His goal is to put a little consistency back into the administration – “It’s what the school is yearning for,” he said. Second, he hopes to ensure that each student feels safe at school and deal with discipline issues. While the English learners and the math program at his school need extra attention, “there’s no reason why we can’t be an 800 API school,” he said. Brownell will enter its fourth year as a federally designated Program Improvement school next year, a title Camacho-Light hopes to shed soon.
“We know where we’re lacking,” he said. “Now we just need to concentrate on those areas.”
An educator since 1994 in the Gilroy Unified School District, Camacho-Light started off teaching theater at Gilroy High School then took on the role of vice principal. He served as assistant principal at Solorsano for a year before moving on to Brownell. Before coming to GUSD, he held several interesting positions, teaching in a one-room schoolhouse in San Benito County and serving as the mayor of Hollister in the 1980s. Born in Monterey, he’s a native Californian and resides in Gilroy with his wife and six children who range in age from seven to 16 and attend Catholic school. His wife teaches special education at GHS and between the two of them and their children, “we’re always running to one school or another,” he said with a smile.
Currently an instructional coach and AVID coordinator at Brownell, Shouse, 30, intends to emphasize skill mastery over exposure. Although she said she’s going to miss the classroom, she is looking forward to working with her new principal.
“He’s amazing,” she said. “He really has his heart in it for the kids.”
