Cordell Elementary Principal leaves a legacy for new leadership
After a long history at Cordell Elementary and an even longer his
tory working in education, Elementary Principal Alan Hull is retiring.
Hull has spent 20 years as the principal at Cordell Elementary, and during that time he said he has grown more and more fond of the staff and students at the school.
With quite the start to his time at Cordell, Hull’s first year was met with a natural disaster.
“In 2001, my first year, a tornado took out the elementary school. The building was still standing, but it peeled the roof down to the metal and blew out windows,” Hull said. “But through all that, I realized that the people of Cordell are down-home, ready to help… That was the way I started in Cordell. And I learned a great appreciation for smalltown comradery in the way everybody rushed to help us.”
Hull’s final year at Cordell somewhat mirrored his first in terms of scope as he finished it off during a pandemic, and he joked that maybe he was the cause of these events.
“Now fast forward and my last year is a pandemic. So the thought occurred to me, ‘well, maybe I’ve been bad luck, and the ice storm was when I showed up and the pandemic is telling me it’s time to retire,’” Hull said laughing.
Looking back at his time as principal, Hull said what he’s been able to accomplish at the school could not have been achieved were it not for the quality of the staff.
“I’m proud of what we’ve been able to do at Cordell,” Hull said. “The quality of the staff, the closeness of the staff, and I think any accolades for Cordell Elementary start with the teachers in the classroom. And I’m very proud of the job that the teachers have done.”
As for the start of his career, Hull comes from a family of educators as his mother and sister both taught at Cordell, and so going into education seemed to come naturally to Hull.
“As I think back, I didn’t consider anything else,” Hull said. “It just kinda just kind of happened. There wasn’t anything else I was dying to do.”
Before coming to Cordell, Hull spent 28 years in education working as a teacher, coach, and principal at other school districts including Mid-Del, Harrah, and Weatherford.
Looking towards his retirement, Hull said he felt it was time for him to end this chapter of his life and move on to something else.
“I just felt it was time. I’m not burned out. I still enjoy my job. I’ve never dreaded coming to work, but I didn’t want to hang on long enough to have that type of attitude,” he said.
Continuing with his summer farm work that he has done in the past is what Hull currently has planned, however, he said he will be looking for something to do during his newfound free time.
“I’m not looking for something I don’t enjoy and I’m not looking for something that I have to go back and get a bunch of training for. I’ve had enough meetings and I’ve got enough degrees,” Hull said jokingly “So if anybody out there has an easy job for an old man, tell them to contact me.”
For any of the students or staff that may miss seeing Hull at the school, they may just bump into him from time to time as he has plans to walk around the building in the fall and winter as a way to stay active.
“I’m not leaving the community,” Hull said. “I’ll still be around, and it’s a small town, so I’ll run into them.”
Mike Higgins has been selected to be the elementary school principal for next year. He has served as a principal for a total of 15 years, and Hull says he has plans to meet with him soon.
“I will be telling him how proud I am of the staff that he’s inheriting,” Hull said. “You can imagine a boss of any business, if the employees are top-notch, then that takes a lot of the stress out of it because you know that they’re going to a top-notch job.”
Overall, Hull said he has quite enjoyed his time as the principal for Cordell Elementary, has enjoyed getting to know its staff and students, and has made lifelong friends along the way.
“I will say that in 1966 when I graduated and went off to college, I never in my wildest dreams thought I’d want to come back. It was like there was a whole world out there. But I not only wanted to come back, but I’m really happy here and glad that my perspective has changed. “