Katy O'Grady-Pyne / Journal

Associate Principal Sasha Young (left) prepares to take on the principal responsibilities next fall from retiring Principal Mary Diener. Diener will end her 28-year tenure with the district when she retires at the close of this school year.

While most students and teachers are excited when the school year comes to a close, the day will be bittersweet for Clinton Elementary School principal Mary Diener.

At the close of this school year, Diener will pass her leadership responsibilities to associate principal Sasha Young. Pekin area native Ben Mooney will serve as the school’s new associate principal.

After 28 years with the district, Diener has mixed emotions about embarking on this new chapter in her life. 

“I never thought about the end; about reaching  (retirement),” she said. “When you’ve done this your whole life, you’ve built a lot of relationships with people. Not seeing those people on a daily basis will be a struggle for me.”

“I’ve been with children almost every day for 33 years,” Diener continued. “I’m going to miss the relationships I have with the children and their parents….I’m going to miss the hugs that I get every day.”

So while she may miss the people, Diener proudly recalls her accomplishments.

When she was named principal at Webster School, the district’s reading scores weren’t meeting the state minimum requirements. Diener used her reading specialist background and created a focused effort on improving it.

“Our reading scores have turned around,” she said proudly. “They are amazing! Our kids love to read and that is one of the things I think I’m really proud of doing for our district.”

Incoming principal Sasha Young agreed and plans to continue the school’s reading program while adding a strong focus to raise the math scores. 

“Because we’ve done so fantastic in reading,” said Young, “I think our math has kind of fallen a little bit.”

 Young also plans to work on school unity.

“I know it started as two separate buildings but now we’ve come together and I want to make a name for CES as it’s own place.”

During the past year working together to transition the school’s leadership, Young and Diener placed on focus on improving student attendance.

“It’s important to have kids here,” said Young. “We want them to be successful. We want this to be a place they want to be.”

So while Diener may be leaving the leadership role of the work she loves, she will still be actively involved.

Retirement plans include remaining in Clinton so she can continue to spend time with her children and grandson, work on restoring her 1950s home, and, not surprisingly, volunteer for the school district.