Posted: 04-Feb-26
Location: Saint Johnsbury, Vermont
Type: Full Time
Salary: $75,000 - $100,000
Required Education:
The mission and proud tradition of St. Johnsbury Academy is to challenge our rising generation to become deep thinkers, bold creators, and responsible, compassionate members of society—always learning, and believing in their readiness and capacity to face the world and make it better.
The Position
St. Johnsbury Academy is seeking a Dean of Students to begin serving in the role in July 2026. The Dean of Students will partner with the Assistant Head for Academics and Student Life, the Associate Headmaster, and the Headmaster to ensure that the school’s educational programs, policies, and practices are coherent, strong, and aligned with its mission and values. The individual in this role will supervise Academy Student Life programs, Class Deans, Advisors, and extracurriculars; partner with Dean of Academics to integrate curriculum and programs that serve the school; and with the Dean of Faculty to support faculty, staff, and administrators in their work to promote connection, community, belonging, and student growth and development. The Dean of Students will support the work of the Headmaster in helping to conceive, plan, and implement a data-and research-informed, mission-driven vision for Academy Student Life.
Role of the Dean of Students
The Dean of Students is a highly visible and trusted leader within the St. Johnsbury Academy community and serves as a passionate advocate for students. Reporting to the Assistant Head for Academic and Student Life, the Dean oversees non-academic, student-centered matters that are essential to student growth, safety, and well-being.
The Dean of Students:
- Supports and communicates compellingly to all constituencies (students, faculty, staff, families) the standards and values of the St. Johnsbury Academy community.
- Collaborates with faculty, counselors, administrators, students, and families to ensure clear expectations and consistent, equitable responses to student behavior.
- Partners with Senior Leadership to conceive and develop programming and initiatives related to student health, development, leadership and learning that will support the mission of the Academy.
- Leads the student disciplinary process with transparency, compassion, and fairness, emphasizing accountability and learning rather than punishment.
- Coordinates closely with health, wellness, residential life, and facilities teams to support student safety, mental health, and crisis response.
- Oversees advisory programming and supervises Class Deans in partnership with the Assistant Head for Academic and Student Life.
- Serves on the Student Support Team and Crisis Response Team, helping to plan and implement safety protocols and campus-wide training.
- Maintains strong relationships with students through daily presence, guidance, and engagement across campus life.
Through this work, the Dean of Students helps students develop self-awareness, resilience, empathy, and accountability, developing skills and personal integrity that will serve them well beyond their time at St. Johnsbury Academy.
Teaching:
- May be required to teach 1 section each semester. Class assignments are based on disciplinary expertise, interest, and the needs of the involved departments each semester; all faculty are expected to be able to teach at the Basic, Standard, and Accelerated levels.
- Prepare syllabi and daily lesson plans for the above.
- Assess and provide evaluation information back to students in a timely manner according to the school calendar.
- Communicate with case managers for students in the special services program as mandated by IEPs and 504 plans, and as needed for the best outcomes for students in the program.
- Be available daily during the conference period at the end of the school day and require students to attend who need to make up work or who need extra assistance.
- Maintain communication with parents/guardians as needed throughout the school year, including up to four parents’ afternoons/nights during the school year, and for one resident parents’ weekend in the fall semester.
- Maintain classroom decorum to Academy standards, including recognizing dress code violations, with the support of department chairs and deans.
- Work collaboratively with colleagues within the department and throughout the school.
Mission and Values
SJA’s mission is grounded in deep optimism about young people, the spirit of inquiry, and belief in the importance of connection, relationships, and community. We do our best to help each student become the best person and learner they can be, and to give them a chance to be part of something bigger than themselves. When students come to St. Johnsbury Academy, they become part of the most talented and diverse group of individuals they may ever know as friends and peers. They develop an intellectual and emotional commitment to understanding the larger world, and to making the community a better place.
Our Campus
SJA’s campus combines traditional academic buildings with houses from the early years of the school and more modern facilities, spread across wide open lawns and trees that glow with color in the fall. The most recent physical additions to campus are the Charles Hosmer Morse Center for the Arts, with six fine arts studios, an art gallery, a print and photography studio, two music performance studios with five practice rooms, a dance studio, and a 200-seat black box theater. The Mayo Center houses our Grace Stuart Orcutt library with 20,000 volumes, private and small group study spaces, and a media presentation room., the Colwell Center for Global Understanding and a student lounge.
Academics
St. Johnsbury Academy offers a rigorous and multi-level academic program that blends traditional college preparatory education with innovative, hands-on learning experiences. With over 200 courses, including Advanced Placement (32), honors, fine arts, world languages, environmental sustainability, and technical education options, SJA supports a wide range of student interests and aspirations.
Students benefit from a dedicated faculty and staff who strive to create a collaborative environment in the classroom and encourage curiosity and exploration. With an average class size of 12, students receive close attention from accomplished and compassionate faculty; many are working professionals; 70% hold terminal degrees in their fields; and all love inspiring young people to become their best version of themselves.
The Academy’s Signature Programs allow for students to immerse themselves in a wide range of programs from high level math and engineering to culinary arts and fashion design. AP Capstone Diploma, Applied Science and STEM Intensive, International Travel and Cultural Exchange,
Post-Calculus Mathematics, and SJA Arts Intensive are just a few of these.
The daily class schedule at the Academy differs from most schools in which classes meet in five 70-minute periods, allowing for students to truly master their understanding of the material and accelerate in their field of study.
College and Career Guidance
St. Johnsbury Academy’s College and Career Counseling provides students with thorough academic and technical development guidance and comprehensive college and career planning personalized to each individual, ensuring they are guided to the right fit for their needs. Each year, students from St. Johnsbury Academy are placed at top universities and liberal arts colleges, culinary schools, fashion design schools, fine arts schools, engineering schools, technical colleges, and an array of other two- and four-year institutions.
Matriculations for the classes of 2024 and 2025 include the following colleges and universities, among many others:
Bates College
Boston University (2)
Bowdoin College
Carnegie Mellon
Colby College
Columbia University (2)
Cornell University
Emerson College
Harvard University
Holy Cross
Dartmouth College (2)
Duke University
Massachusetts College of Technology (MIT)
Middlebury College
Mt. Holyoke
New York University (2)
Rice University
University of California, Berkeley
University of Chicago
University of Southern California
Yale University
Career and Technical Education
St. Johnsbury Academy differs from other schools in many ways, and one of the most compelling is access to our award-winning technical education program. Whether a student is planning to seek work or further education in a technical field or plans to attend college, they are able to take courses within our Career and Technical Education career programs: Architecture and Construction; Business and Management; Culinary Arts, Human and Professional Services (Nursing, public safety); Welding, Plumbing, Electrical and Automotive Technologies. In addition to classrooms, this department has workshops for students to exhibit practical training.
Within several of these clusters, students can pursue our SJA Technical Career Intensive: a program that allows interested students to delve deeply into a single area of study. As they work through their chosen Technical Career Intensive Concentration, students obtain impressive experience and credentials that translate into a competitive edge in future study or the pursuit of a career—for instance, the Academy is piloting for the state of Vermont a 2nd-year apprentice program in electrical and plumbing trades, so students can take technical college-level courses toward mastery in those fields.
The Arts
The Visual and Performing Arts department at the Academy offers an inclusive community for students to express themselves in healthy, creative ways with over 30 courses offered in visual and performing arts ranging from photography and printmaking to modern dance and acting. Students enjoy a spacious, state-of-the-art facility that features a 220-seat theater, dance studio, music studio with sound-proof practice rooms, Mac computer lab for graphic design and film editing, photographic dark room, clay studio, and several large studio spaces with north-facing light.
In addition to the course offerings, the Academy’s Arts program provides an extremely diverse range of extracurricular opportunities including Academy Theatre, Art and Fashion club, photo lab, ceramics, and intaglio printmaking. Each year, students also have the opportunity to participate in the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, where each year many Academy students win national gold or silver medals.
Extracurriculars
Outside of the classroom, athletics and extracurricular life is a cornerstone of our community. With a philosophy that extracurriculars are critical to education—promoting resilience, sportsmanship, and lifelong skill-building—students balance active learning with teamwork, leadership, and school spirit, whether competing on the field or collaborating on creative and civic initiatives.
Roughly 40–45% of students engage in at least one of our over 40 interscholastic teams, including Vermont Division I football, soccer, basketball, skiing, lacrosse, cross-country, wrestling, gymnastics, cheerleading, and hockey. The Outing club leads hiking and ice-climbing adventures, and our Mountain Bike Club rides and practices at Kingdom Trails -known for some of the best trails in the country.
Beyond sports, students can choose from over 60 clubs and leadership groups—ranging from Model UN, Science Olympiad, and Robotics to Academy Theatre and National Honor Society—and participate in service opportunities, student government, performances and productions, and an acclaimed FIRST Robotics team. Recently added is our “X-block” which allows students the opportunity to earn after-school credit to experience faculty interest-driven, non-traditional classes such as American sign language or “Introductory Barista.”
Student Support
In order to support our wide range of students, SJA has support built in for all students, and personalized learning support for students with identified learning challenges. Advisories pair faculty members with small groups of students from the same class year who meet together multiple times a week throughout the four-year high school career. The advisor is one of many adults on campus who create immediate connections with students and families.
All students benefit from daily Conference Period, when teachers remain in their classrooms after school for one-on-one meetings; the Learning Center is open throughout the school day for students to access academic support during their study halls from teachers in a variety of subject areas. The Guided Studies program offers the highest level of learning support.
Our health center has three full-time mental health counselors on staff for scheduled meetings and drop-in social-emotional support.
When students make mistakes at St. Johnsbury Academy, they are guided to reflect, take responsibility, repair harm, and grow. The Dean of Students leads this work with empathy and consistency, ensuring discipline is fair, developmentally appropriate, and aligned with the Academy’s commitment to equity and student success.
Desired Qualities and Qualifications
The Dean of Students will enthusiastically embrace St. Johnsbury Academy’s mission, values, and commitment to educating the whole student. The ideal candidate is a visible, relational leader who finds purpose in supporting adolescents through moments of growth, challenge, and reflection, and who believes deeply in the power of accountability, equity, and community.
The successful candidate will demonstrate:
- A strong commitment to advocating for high-school-aged students and amplifying student voice while upholding clear and consistent community expectations.
- Proven ability to build trusting, respectful relationships with students, families, faculty, and staff through thoughtful listening, clear communication, and presence.
- Experience leading or supporting student disciplinary processes with empathy, fairness, transparency, and a learning-centered approach; familiarity with restorative practices is highly valued.
- A demonstrated commitment to equity, inclusion, and belonging, with the ability to recognize and respond to students’ individual experiences and needs in decision-making and discipline.
- Strong collaborative skills and the ability to work effectively with counselors, administrators, residential life staff, health and wellness professionals, and faculty.
- Excellent organizational and managerial skills, including experience overseeing multiple systems, programs, or teams within a school environment.
- High emotional intelligence, sound judgment, and the ability to remain calm, reflective, and compassionate in complex or high-stakes situations.
- Clear and effective written and verbal communication skills, particularly when navigating sensitive student matters with families and colleagues.
Education and Experience:
- Bachelor’s degree required; master’s degree preferred.
- At least four years of teaching experience at the secondary level.
- Demonstrated leadership experience within a school setting, preferably in student life, discipline, or advisory roles.
- Experience supervising people and programs in a dynamic educational environment.