Nancy Bonnifield is the interim principal for this school year at Kimball Area High School. Staff photo by Jean Doran Matua.
By Jean Doran Matua, Editor
She’s the new principal, but hardly new at Kimball. Nancy Bonnifield is starting her 20th year at Kimball Area High School.
Bonnifield had been promoted to Director of Teaching and Learning just weeks before superintendent Jim Wagner resigned. This position would have removed her from student contact and instead focused on curriculum and testing. She held this position only 2-3 weeks before she became interim principal and former principal Erik Widvey became interim superintendent.
“Now I get the kids back,” Bonnifield exclaimed. “It’s a win-win.”
Both Bonnifield and Widvey have the education and certification to move up in their administrative roles. They already know the students, staff, and facilities, and everyone knows them.
“So many people told me I’d be a good principal,” she explained, that she got her post-graduate certificate in Educational Administration from SCSU, just in case an opportunity arose.
“It’s a great job,” she says. “I love it.” The fast days, being around kids, and variety.
Time will be a challenge for her. In addition to her role as principal, she’s also doing the curriculum, testing, staff development, and reporting portion of her previous, brief position, so there’s a lot to do. The tasks are not difficult, she explains, if you have uninterupted time.
“I couldn’t ask for a better team,” she says. Erik Widvey and Keri Johnson (elementary principal) have been very helpful in this transition.
Bonnifield has a degree from Bethel University in business management. In 1999 she was hired at Kimball, with no teaching license. She got her license, and a Masters degree from the
U of M.
Bonnifield lives in Dassel with her husband and three children.