Aaron Spence took his new post in September as the leader of a school system that had drawn national headlines for its handling of sexual assault cases and heated debates about hot-button issues. Now, nearing the end of his first school year with Loudoun County Public Schools, he says he’s listening to the community and building a relationship with a school board that began its work in January. He talked with us about his work so far.
You started at a time when there have been some difficult issues in Loudoun. How have you dealt with that?
One of the things I committed to with this board was to really listen and learn from our community about what their concerns are and work to be very transparent. I’ve been really trying to be visible, build relationships in the community, with parents, with our staff — visiting schools, getting to know key leaders in the community and members of our business community, and just really working hard to reestablish some trust.
What do you hear most often from educators and parents? We have a community that really supports its schools and really is invested in our school division.
So mostly, what I’m hearing with regards to the other conversation [about controversies] is, people are tired of it. They’re tired of the politics around it and they want our school division to get out of the news and only be there for the great things that it’s known for, which is great teaching, high performance, and lots and lots of opportunities for the kids that we serve.
How do you see the role of a parent in education?
I’ve been an educator for nearly 30 years, and parents have always been our first and best partners in the educational experience. Parents are their children’s first teachers. They always have been, they always will be. And our job is to partner on a daily basis with our parents, because our parents know who their children are — they know their strengths and their needs.
How do you see the effects of the pandemic lingering?
So many people, all they want to focus on is what was lost and what I’m wanting to focus on is where we’re going and about the comeback that public education has seen. And that’s important as a distinction because I hear all the time, ‘Your test scores have dropped.’ Well, of course, they dropped. The question now is … where do we go from here? How do we improve? And that kind of persistence and resilience is what I’m seeing in our schools. And that’s what we should be talking about.
Loudoun County has been making an effort to help kids with mental health challenges. Tell us about that.
There’s a significant push in Loudoun County to provide the kinds of supports that our students need. Some of that is through staffing. So, making sure that students have access to school counselors, to school psychologists, to social workers, to student assistant specialists. We’ve heard a lot of people say, ‘It’s not the school’s job to provide mental health to my child.’ Well, I would say it is our job to help students who are struggling with mental health issues by partnering with their families.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Feature image of Aaron Spence courtesy Loudoun County Public Schools
This story originally ran in our May issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to Northern Virginia Magazine.
