SALISBURY — Rowan-Salisbury School System officials will be looking for a new principal for Knox Middle School after Rodney Burton announced Friday he is stepping down.
Burton is the second principal to resign from Knox in the past 18 months.
He is leaving the job for “personal reasons,” Rowan-Salisbury School System spokeswoman Rita Foil said Friday.
“Mr. Burton requested to be moved to an assistant principal’s position for personal reasons. Our district has honored that request,” Foil wrote in an email in response to an inquiry from the Post.
Burton will be reassigned to China Grove Elementary School as an assistant principal, a job that has been filled on an interim basis by Larry Britt, a retired school system employee, Foil said.
Friday was a teacher work day for the school system and students were not in classes. When Knox students return Monday, Larry Brown will be in place as their interim principal, Foil said.
Brown, who retired as an assistant principal at Bostian Elementary School, served as interim principal at Knox Middle after former principal Gerald MoragneEl resigned in September 2009, also citing personal reasons.
MoragneEl served as principal for one full academic year and resigned just weeks into the 2009-10 school year.
Burton took the job in October 2009. He was recommended to the Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education from about a dozen applicants interviewed by a committee of school personnel, teachers and parents.
He had been an assistant principal at North Rowan Middle since 2003 before moving to Knox. He was selected as the 2006-07 Rowan-Salisbury Schools’ Middle School Assistant Principal of the Year.
Brown has also served as an interim principal at North Rowan and Erwin middle schools. He will be at Knox until the school system names a new principal Foil said.
The job will be advertised starting Monday and could take up to a couple of months to fill.
“We are fortunate to have Mr. Brown’s leadership and school experience to carry us through this transition,” Foil said.
Burton could not be reached for comment.