ACPS has appointed T.C. Williams alum, administrator and founding member and chair of the Athletic Hall of Fame Mark Eisenhour as the Director of Student Activities.
Eisenhour will oversee all extracurricular activities as well as athletic teams, training and competitive games at T.C. Williams King Street and Minnie Howard campuses and the middle schools. He will pay particular attention to connecting students to the academic curriculum through engagement in extracurricular activities.
“We want to welcome Mr. Eisenhour to this role. He has spent 25 years working in various capacities for ACPS and we know he will bring his commitment as well as his deep institutional knowledge to this position. Our community has a long history of athletic success and extracurricular opportunities for students. We are confident that with this appointment we can continue this tradition, as well as focusing on helping every student succeed academically,” said Superintendent Alvin L. Crawley.
Eisenhour has been a student, parent, coach, teacher and administrator with ACPS. He graduated from T.C. Williams in 1986 and was a dean and the assistant principal at Minnie Howard campus before helping to plan the International Academy at T.C. Williams and becoming academic principal of the Pathways to Graduation program.
In 2012, he became Principal on Assignment for the new Jefferson-Houston School construction project that was named 2016 LEED project of the year and managed projects such as the T.C. Williams tennis courts and stadium landscaping project.
In 2014, he helped establish the Athletic Hall of Fame as a founding member and chair of the selection committee and in 2015 brought back the coaches from the 1971 State Championship football team, Herman Boone and Bill Yoast, to be honored. This year, the Hall of Fame intends to honor retired track coach and former Director of Student Activities A.K. Johnson under Eisenhour’s continued leadership. In his spare time, he has coached crew for T.C. Williams and is a football and baseball announcer.
“Anybody who has been to a school tour or Back-to-School night will have heard me introduce myself as Assistant Principal, Class of ’86 and Titan for life. I have been connected to T.C. Williams all my life and am highly vested in the success of its students and connecting them to their school. I want to give students a reason to love school and have a sense of school pride so that in the longer term this has an impact on academics. Helping students make positive, productive connections to school will be a hallmark of my approach,” said Eisenhour.
He believes that the role of the Director of Student Activities is to enrich students’ high school experience and instill values of pride, teamwork and determination that are sometimes difficult to instill in the classroom. Much of Eisenhour’s work will revolve around goal 5 of the ACPS 2020 Strategic Plan – Health and Wellness – that ensures that every student succeeds.
“I am committed to making sure that the interests of our students and families are our top priority. My goal is to ensure that all students get what opportunities are available to them and are able to seize them and grow from them. I have always been passionate about ACPS and the education we offer here. I want to instill that passion in all the students at T.C. Williams,” Eisenhour said.
Eisenhour will start in the position in December, following the retirement of current Student Activities Director Steve Colantuoni.