Keri Collison will be the new principal at Peculiar Elementary School, effective July 1, 2020. The Ray-Pec School Board approved the hiring at its Jan. 23 meeting.
Collison has been a resident and parent of two children in the Ray-Pec School District for 14 years. This familiarity attracted her to the elementary school principal post.
“I have experienced several of the programs the district offers to students with my own children,” she said. “It is through these experiences and many wonderful teachers along the way, that our family became connected to and invested in the district. Ray-Pec has a ‘family feel’ and values relationships and collaboration, as well as parent involvement. I am looking forward to the opportunity to learn and partner with the staff, students, and families of our district!”
Collison is currently the principal of the High Grove Early Childhood Education Center in the Grandview School District. She has held this position since June 2015. She also held two other positions in the Grandview School District. From 2011 to 2015, she was the school psychological examiner for the Early Childhood Special Education Program, and from 2006 to 2011, she was the Process Coordinator for the Early Childhood Special Education Program.
Earlier, from 2004 to 2006, she was an educational diagnostician for two elementary schools in Houston, Texas, and from 1999 to 2004, she worked at Boone Elementary School in Houston, first as a classroom teacher and then as a special education life skills teacher.
Collison earned a bachelor’s degree in education from the University of Nebraska at Kearney, a master’s degree in education at the University of Houston, and an educational specialist degree in school administration from the University of Central Missouri.
Collison and her husband, Lance, are originally from Nebraska. They have two sons, Reed and Carter, who attend 5th and 9th grade in Ray-Pec schools. In her free time, she enjoys going to the lake with her family, snow skiing, traveling to the mountains, reading, and hunting.
She will replace longtime Principal Rob Weida, who is retiring at the end of the 2019-2020 school year.