Kip Herren keeps the clipping in a frame in his office. In it a former hell-on-wheels student leaps into a joyous coach Herren’s open arms in sheer exuberance after winning a state wrestling title.
Twenty-nine years in Auburn’s schools have put an impressive array of facts and figures at Herren’s fingertips. What there is to know about curricula, testing, education reform and WASL, Kip knows. But that photo is there to remind him what the whole show is about. That kid today is a successful businessman whose wife just gave birth to triplets.
“I keep it because that leap reminds me that if you give kids that opportunity first and then you give them the structure and the care, they can achieve,” said Herren, the newly-appointed superintendent of the Auburn School District.
