The Mission of Leadership
An Interview with Assistant Principals
Mary Castellano and Fadia Desmond
By Principal Theresa Rodgers
The assistant principal position is one of the hardest jobs on any high school campus.
The varied responsibilities and many time-sensitive issues that an assistant principal has
to deal with on a continual basis requires this person to be always on her toes, quickthinking, articulate and joyful. We are blessed to have two amazing women who serve as
our assistant principals. Mary Castellano, who is in her third year as the 11th and 12th
grade assistant principal and Fadia Desmond, our first year 9th and 10th grade assistant
principal, are highly-qualified, intelligent professionals who serve our community with
passion and dedication to our mission. I am honored to call them colleagues and friends.
What is your education and professional background?
MC: I was blessed to receive most of my education from
Catholic institutions. Because my family moved many times
during my younger years, I went to Catholic schools in
Pennsylvania, Southern and Northern California. The family
finally settled in the Bay Area, and I was able to graduate from
Saint Francis High School in Mountain View. I then attended
Santa Clara University with the goal of becoming a doctor. After
taking a few political science courses, I realized that politics and
history were my passion. Intent on entering corporate America,
I began a career in technology sales. It was there that I had the
opportunity to volunteer in a middle school teaching Personal
Economics through Junior Achievement. It was through this
program that I finally found my calling. I applied to Santa Clara
University’s Counseling, Psychology and Education program,
and began pursuing a career as a social science teacher. After
completing my Masters in Interdisciplinary Education, I began
working as a high school teacher in the San Jose Unified School
District. Two years later, I was offered a position at St. Francis
where I worked as a classroom teacher for nine years and an assistant principal for the past three years.
FD: I attended Marymount High School in Los Angeles. I loved
math and science, but found that English was my most challenging subject! That is the reason I decided to major in English
at UCLA; I felt it was an area where I truly could learn and
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improve. As an English major, I added an emphasis in American
Studies and that gave me a strong focus on American Literature
for many of my upper division and seminar courses. I also completed a Specialization i n Education. I had the opportunity to
serve as a TA for a lower division Education course as a sophomore and that is I when I realized I loved being in the classroom.
I completed my MA in Education and Single Subject Teaching
Credential through an accelerated program at Stanford. My
first teaching position was at Rocklin High School in their
English Department. As much as I loved teaching, I loved being
a student even more which factored into my decision to return
to graduate school to pursue a Ph.D. in Education at UC Davis.
The focus of my research was pathways to success for educationally and economically disadvantaged students at the college level.
During my time at UC Davis I worked across many departments
on campus. I conducted research in Science Education that
looked at curriculum and instruction in introductory Physics
classes. Most of my experience was in the School of Medicine
where I worked as an advisor to students applying to medical
school. After completing my Ph.D., I spent time working with
graduate students who were completing their Doctorate in
Education and primarily served as their Dissertation Chair. I did
a great deal of mentoring and editing through this work.