SOUTH CAROLINA — Students at five diocesan schools will be greeted by new principals this year.
Sandra Leatherwood, assistant at the Diocesan Catholic Schools Office, said Summerville Catholic, St. Peter in Beaufort, and St. Anne in Rock Hill all have new leaders. Blessed Sacrament in Charleston and Nativity on James Island have appointed interim principals.
Blessed Sacrament
Roseann Tracy, interim principal, attended Catholic grade and high schools in New Jersey. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Ladycliff College for women in New York, and has attended The Citadel in Charleston for graduate studies. Tracy has been a teacher at Blessed Sacrament for six years, most recently at the second-grade level, and also has served as assistant principal at Charleston Catholic. She and her husband Mark have two grown sons.
St. Peter
Chris Trott received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Salisbury University in Maryland and a master’s in education with a focus on Catholic school administration from Marymount University in Virginia. Trott would like to increase the visibility of the school in the community, coordinate efforts to develop a computer lab, and enhance the parish-school relationship. He and his wife Bree have a daughter named Savannah. Trott was most recently a principal in the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., at St. Hugh’s Catholic School.
Summerville Catholic
Lisa Tanner has served in the education field for 23 years, with 17 of them unfolding at Summerville Catholic. She has a Bachelor of Science degree in elementary and special education from Bowling Green State University in Ohio, and earned a master’s in education in curriculum and instruction from The Citadel in Charleston. Tanner completed a certificate program in Catholic school administration through Virginia’s Marymount University.
St. Anne
Bonnie Polewski grew up in St. Louis, Mo., where she attended Notre Dame High School and Notre Dame College. In 1980, she married Ron Polewski. For the next 26 years, Ron served in the Army and the Polewski family moved from Germany to Hawaii and many places in between. They have five children and a daughter-in-law. Recently, Mrs. Polewski received her master’s in educational leadership from the University of Texas at San Antonio. Prior to accepting the job in Rock Hill, she served as the assistant principal for academics at Central Catholic High School in San Antonio.
Nativity
Patty Dukes is an alumna of both Blessed Sacrament and Bishop England High schools in Charleston. She will serve as interim principal of Nativity, where she has taught for the past 15 years, most recently at the first-grade level. Dukes attended East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina, and earned a bachelor’s degree in elementary education. She and her husband James have two daughters.