AMHERST – A Salem school principal who was New Hampshire’s Elementary School Principal of the Year in 2015 has been named the new principal of the Clark-Wilkins School.

At the Monday night school board meeting Superintendent Adam Steel announced that Anna Parrill, current principal of the William T. Barron Elementary School was his choice, and the board voted to approve the nomination.

Steel told the board that he settled on Parrill at the end of “an exhaustive search.” Thirty-one qualified people had applied for the position, he said, and he meet with 16. Then he and a search team narrowed the nominations down to two. The team visited the both candidates at their New Hampshire schools before deciding on Parrill.

Last week, when the search team visited with about 30 people at the Barron School, Steel said “half were in tears” as they talked about Parrill’s impact on their lives and they were “attributing their growth directly to her.

“She is exactly what the school needs at this time,” he said. “Frankly, as a new superintendent who feels he doesn’t know what he’s doing most of the time, I feel fortunate that someone like Anna would want to work for me and my team. We struck gold.”

Clark School is the pre-kindergarten and full-day kindergarten school and Wilkins is grades 1-4.

Parrill will have a three-year contract and a starting salary of $125,000, making her one of the highest paid elementary school principals in New Hampshire, according to Steel.

She will replace Nicola Fraley, who resigned unexpectedly in March.

Parrill has been a public school educator for three decades and an administrator for 24 years. On the Salem school district website, she says she is originally from Ohio where she earned an undergraduate degree from Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio.

“I moved to New England for a coaching position at Middlebury College as an Assistant Basketball Coach and then Head Softball coach at Castleton State College prior to teaching in Raymond, New Hampshire. I continued my education at the University of Vermont where I earned my Master’s Degree in Curriculum and Instruction while serving as the Intramural Coordinator for the university. I then returned to teaching again in Raymond. I moved into the Assistant Principal position at the middle school in Raymond. I went back to school at the University of New Hampshire where I earned my CAGS (Certificate of Advanced Graduate Studies) degree in administration. I continued my administrative experience in Hampstead, Nashua, and Dover at the middle school and elementary school level prior to joining Salem’s Leadership team.”

Kathy Cleveland may be reached at 673-3100 or kcleveland@cabinet.com.