Ezekiel Gillespie Middle School’s assistant principal of five years is ready to step into his new role as principal of Annie Greencrow Whitehorse Middle School this school year.
Becoming a principal wasn’t always Jabalja Gussine’s goal.
Gussine earned his bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and was pursuing a career as a probation officer. But after observing students in youth peer court doing restorative justice work for their classmates, he turned his eyes to education.
“It was then when I got the insight,” he said. “I wanted to work with all students”.
Since then, Gussine returned to Ezekiel Gillespie, not as a student who lived across the street, but this time as assistant principal.
“This was different. I had such a different impact than I’ve ever imagined,” he said. “It was really hard to leave Gillespie”.
There, he worked to improve school systems, student safety, educator development, and community engagement to help his students be successful.
Now in this transition period, Gussine is applying his previous experience at Madison schools to Whitehorse.
A major goal of his transition is to connect with the families in his new community in Whitehorse. At Gillespie, his connection to the student body was “natural,” he said, because he grew up with the students’ families. In his new location, he is intent on building similarly strong connections in the Whitehorse neighborhoods.
“I just want to come in with the mindset of building community and making sure students feel seen and heard,” Gussine said.
In the lead-up to the fall semester, he’s been meeting with Whitehorse staff to prepare for the school year. He observed the school has a sense of pride that he is looking forward to being a part of.
As for academics, he wants to continue Whitehorse’s success in accelerated learning. This means extended accelerated periods on alternating days for mathematics and language arts to prioritize grade-level learning.
To create an engaging environment for students, Gussine is working to integrate active discussion into the classroom. He’s creating new curricula across subjects to encourage students to talk about their academic topics and learning targets with each other.
“I want to hear the students more than teachers,” he said. “I want to shift that mindset of the teachers doing the heavy lifting and start putting that on our scholars. I know that they’re capable of it, and we’ll just have to help them figure out how to express it in a meaningful way.”
As part of this setup, his school is working on building extensions into the school day for kids that need it. This allows students to be able to keep an accelerated pace in core classes and provide grade-level opportunities.
Beyond academics, Gussine wants to support Whitehorse kids outside of school hours through activities such as dances, talent shows, monthly chances to highlight students for their achievements during breakfasts, and celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month.
While these are all still visions, Gussine is hoping to bring these new traditions that bridge the mornings, class time, and evening in the middle school.
This is all part of his plan to assist students who historically needed more support in and around academics.
Whitehorse has a diverse student population; Black students make up a third and Latino students a quarter of the student body. Additionally, just over half of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-cost lunch.
“Prior to the interview, I was looking at the demographics,” Gussine said. “That was a huge draw to this school for me. Once I saw that, I was like, this is where I belong. This is where I should be.”
His goal is to provide opportunities for families to come into the building in the evening and during the day to help the school strengthen its partnership with busy working families.
Gussine said that he identifies with the families in the neighborhoods that draw into Whitehorse because he came from a single-parent household.
“I’m here for our students and our staff are here too,” he said.
During his time in MMSD, Gussine feels well-resourced by the district to achieve his goals.
While he and his team are still in the process of adapting and improving, he said his associate superintendent and partner principals have been supporting him through this transition for his first day of school on Sept. 1.
