An Interview with Scott Thomson

Abstract

NASSP begins the decade of the '80s with a change in Associ ation leadership. After five years of service as NASSP's deputy executive director, Scott D. Thomson succeeds Owen Kier nan as chief executive officer of the Association. In his capacity as deputy ex ecutive director, Thomson ad ministered NASSP's research office, spearheading the Associa tion's recent studies and publica tions on competency testing, graduation requirements, the high school principalship, SA T scores, and school organization. In 1975, he was chairman of NASSP's special task force charged with develop ing the Association's bicentennial paper on American secondary educa tion, Secondary Schools in a Changing Society: This We Believe. Before joining NASSP, Thomson, who has doctor's and master's degrees from Stanford University and a bachelor's degree from Wil lamette University, was head of the Evanston (Ill.) Township High School district for six years. During the 1960s he was principal of Cubberly High School in Palo Alto, Calif, and before that an assistant principal at Homestead High School in Sunnyvale, Calif. He started his career in education as a teacher in Fremont High School, Sunnyvale, Calif. On the following pages the new executive director discusses with Bulletin editors his plans, his projections for education and the principal ship, and Association priorities for the new decade.