A graduate of Mark Keppel High School who spent the entirety of her career in education has returned as the new principal. Alejandra Perez, recently appointed as MKHS principal, graduated in 1986 and began teaching at AUSD in 1995. After graduating from Keppel, she went to Cal State L.A. and graduated with a degree in teaching, leading her to where she is now. After graduating from Cal State L.A., she taught Spanish at Alhambra High School for 20 years from 1995 to 2015. After her last year teaching at AHS, she became an assistant principal for five years at Mark Keppel working in the Student Support Services as well as Business and Activities.
“So far, it’s definitely different, different from when you’re an assistant principal,” said Mrs. Perez. Before serving as the principal of Keppel, Mrs. Perez mentioned how things were done differently at various points in her career. “When you’re the assistant principal, you have a job to do and it requires a lot of deadlines, a lot of things that have to get done. As the principal, you kind of just supervise and guide your team to work together to accomplish what they need to do. So, I noticed as a principal that there [are] a lot more meetings and you attend more to like the parents’ concerns like they’re always wanting to talk to you. So, that’s a little bit different.”
Serving as a first-time principal, Mrs. Perez has many goals set out for our school year. “Well, I wanted this year to look at what has happened in the last four years since I’ve been gone and I know since I left we went to the virtual year. So, I know that it’s taken a while for kids to come back and get used to what’s happening and we have a lot of new stuff going on like power time.
Further, she said we can, “create an environment for students, staff, parents, and everyone, where they feel safe, where they feel they belong to the MK community. They can come to me or to any adult on campus or me or if they have a concern or question, that they can feel free to ask me and that I can help them in any way that we can. But always, the goal is to provide the best education for all students, not just for a certain group, but for all students. So, we need to be able to reach every student and make every student feel like they belong to MK.
The position of principal at MKHS opened at the last minute in July when former principal, Jeanne Guiterrez, decided to take a leave of absence. Around the same time, San Gabriel High School had also elected a new principal; therefore, Mrs. Perez thought the chance to move up was over. “ We didn’t know that this position was going to open, it was just out of the blue,” Mrs. Perez said. “Yeah, it wasn’t like it was planned or anything, it just happened. We were all also surprised.” Mrs. Perez said she was surprised when another position opened at Keppel because someone had just filled the position of principal at San Gabriel High School. “They said there was no position at Keppel and we were all like “What happened?”
Not just as the principal, Mrs. Perez is also the mother of four and the grandmother of nine. “ I have nine grandchildren,” she mentioned. I have four children, three of them are the ones that are married that are all older like 33, 34, [and] 35 and they’re the ones that are married with grandchildren. Then I have a senior in high school.”
