After working in Cherry Hill Public Schools for eight years, Superintendent Maureen Reusche is going home.
Reusche submitted her resignation on March 18. The resignation will go into effect on July 1, at which time she will take over as superintendent in the Haverford Township School District in Pennsylvania. The Haverford Township School District Board of Education officially announced Reusche as its new superintendent on March 19.
Reusche’s decision to leave Cherry Hill for Haverford was strictly a personal one.
“I have strong personal connections to the Haverford Township School District in Pennsylvania,” she said. “My husband and I both grew up there.”
Reusche said she wasn’t looking to leave the Cherry Hill Public Schools when the consultant doing the superintendent search for Haverford contacted her, but the opportunity to return to her childhood home was an opportunity Reusche couldn’t pass up.
However, to return to Haverford, she would have to leave the district she called home for the past eight years.
“I think people are surprised,” Reusche said of the response from the Cherry Hill community. “But when they hear about the personal connection, the response is that it makes sense.”
The Cherry Hill Board of Education announced in a statement following Reusche’s resignation it would begin the process of hiring a new superintendent immediately. The board plans to keep the community updated on the process at future meetings.
Reusche will leave Cherry Hill Public Schools after serving four years as an assistant superintendent and four as superintendent.
“Cherry Hill is a wonderful place to work,” she said. “I have been very happy here working in the district.”
Reusche’s favorite thing about the school district is meeting people who keep the district running, from her fellow administrators working out of the Malberg building to the many teachers and students who frequent the 19 schools.
The one thing Reusche is most proud of is the line of communication she opened with the teachers. She enjoyed visiting the schools and listening to teacher feedback on a variety of educational issues.
“I am particularly proud of the relationship that I’ve established with the teachers,” she said. “I would like to think they describe me as a familiar face that they see in their buildings.”
Reusche also enjoyed meeting students throughout the district. With Cherry Hill Public Schools comprising of more than 11,000 students, it was impossible to meet each and every student. However, Reusche made an effort to get to know as many students as possible. She recalls students she met when she first came to Cherry Hill in 2007 and how she’s watched them move through elementary, middle and high school.
“In a district this size, there are students that I’ve been able to watch progress through the system,” she said. “While there are many children I do not have the opportunity to interact with, it has been delightful when those occurrences have taken place for me.”
One of the ways Reusche has been able to connect with individual students has been through town halls at Cherry Hill East and Cherry Hill West this year. Reusche credited the board of education student representatives for playing a huge role in bridging the gap between administrators and students.
Reusche also expressed her love of the district’s diversity. Each school has its own character and culture. While the curriculum may be the same for each grade level, Reusche said she enjoyed the unique ways some schools presented the curriculum.
“It’s one of the things that makes it interesting to work here,” she said.
While Reusche is excited to be able to return home to Haverford in July, she is also saddened to leave Cherry Hill.
“This has been a phenomenal experience,” she said. “It’s been a great ride here. With the size of the district, there’s so much that happens.”
