Long-time educator Benji Betts has worked as Principal Tom Zobel’s right-hand man for the past four years. Now, he will lead the school when Zobel retires at the end of the month.
For six years, Zobel served as principal of Whiteland Community High School, a small portion of his 35 years in education. Before coming to Whiteland, he worked for Shelbyville schools, where he spent three years as an assistant principal and eight years as principal of Shelbyville High School.
Zobel is most proud of stepping into a position that had seen a lot of turnover and establishing some stability and a good working relationship with the administration and teachers, he said.
“I think there’s a lot of good, hardworking people here,” Zobel said. “When I came in, this position was in a bit of a flux, they’d had some turnover. What I tried to do was stabilize the staff and administrative team here and get some balance in what was going on. What I’m most proud of is we were able to just establish some sort of comfort level with the administrative team and the teachers.”
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Zobel is handing over the reins to Betts, who will be a high school principal for the first time. He served as assistant principal under Zobel. Betts has spent two decades in education, and has worked in three other Johnson County school districts.
During the past four years, Zobel taught him a high standard of professionalism, Betts said.
“Tom brought me into work with him and has been an unbelievable mentor to me over the past four years,” Betts said. “Seeing him work with students and staff and the community and the central office, and the level of professionalism … (and) still being an accessible person for all is something you can’t emulate, but hopefully learn from it and continue it in your professional career.”
As principal, Betts hopes to continue to build relationships with students and staff, along with the parents and the Clark-Pleasant community as a whole. He also wants to continue to have students test well compared to other schools around the county and state, he said.
The opportunities Clark-Pleasant gives its students makes it a great place to work, he said.
“It is a community that values the education of children and wants to be a collaborative place where they are considered part of a child’s journey through school,” Betts said. “Knowing the people I’ve met along the way, we have great staff, a great community and great people giving kids opportunities to do whatever they feel they want to do after high school.”
Those opportunities include immediately pursuing a technical career or continuing on to college, he said.
While Betts settles into his new role, Zobel plans to enjoy his retirement. He’ll take some time to relax and go on vacation before returning to what he loves: education. He won’t be working in what he describes as the day-to-day grind, but he’ll explore other opportunities that will allow him to continue to be involved with helping people learn, he said.
He’ll still miss part of that day-to-day grind, he said, at least when it comes to working at Clark-Pleasant.
“There’s just a lot of good people here," Zobel said. "I’ll miss being around the day-to-day interactions I have with those really talented, hardworking people."
