HEYWORTH - Brian Roney's job description as assistant principal at Heyworth Junior/Senior High School includes student discipline, but he hopes it can be more about relationships than cracking the whip.

"The most important thing to me now is developing those relationships," said Roney, 41, who started on the job July 1. "I need to let kids know what I'm about."

Once those relationships are formed, Roney hopes "fair" and "honest" are terms others use to describe him.

"If you talked to my former students, I think they would say I'm fair, and former colleagues would say I'm honest."

Roney is the first assistant principal at the facility, and his 49-item list of duties also includes other supervisory roles such as teacher evaluation.

Superintendent Randy Merker said one of his goals upon arriving two years ago was to get another administrator on board to help junior/senior high school principal Jeff Asmus. And Merker said Roney will jump right into the educational planning.

"He's not going to do just busy work at the high school, and we're excited about the knowledge and skills he brings to us," Merker said.

One example he cited was teacher evaluations. Instructors go through a four-year process to receive tenure, and Merker said all four administrators will be in the classroom observing each teacher undergo that process.

"All four administrators will help evaluate each new teacher," he said, "to help mold those teachers into quality educators."

Athletic background

Growing up in Decatur in a family of nine children, Roney described his upbringing as "blue collar," with his father working as a firefighter and his mother as a secretary. Roney said an aunt influenced his decision to pursue education.

"It was a natural fit," he said. "I was always in leadership roles, and I communicate pretty well."

After earning his education degree from Eastern Illinois University in 1989, his career began with a five-year stint as physical education instructor and coach in the southern Illinois town of Oblong. He moved to Greenville for another five years, then spent time at Streator Woodland, where he also took on athletic director duties.

It was at Streator that he became familiar with fellow-Midstate Conference school Heyworth. He credits some of the relationships he formed with local coaches as one reason he decided to pursue the assistant principal post.

Roney's athletic background includes playing high school baseball and basketball at Decatur St. Theresa, as well as extensive coaching at the junior and senior high school level.

He said he will miss coaching, but that time constraints will not make it possible at this time.

Learning names

One of the most difficult aspects of his job at Heyworth?

"I'm just trying to learn all the names; not just students' names, but those of faculty members," Roney said.

Roney and his wife of 16 years, Pam, live in Normal. They have two children, Heather, 15 and Taylor, 13.

And while careers in education don't exactly run in his family, Roney has a brother who is a dean of students and a sister who helps hearing impaired students at the university level.