It does not take long to realize Darron Underwood has a vested interest at Ouachita Junior High School.
Walking into his office off Kansas Lane, the new principal is wearing his letterman sweater proudly displaying the Ouachita “O”.
“You can say I have some buy-in,” Underwood said.
Underwood attended the junior high he is now leading. He graduated from Ouachita Parish High School in 1999, and his original goal was to teach math at his alma mater.
After spending three years teaching Algebra and Engineering at Rayville High School, Underwood had a seed planted in him by the Richland Parish Superintendent.
“He said, ‘I think you should consider administration. I like the way you are presenting things. I like the way students are responding to you, and you seem like a pretty bright guy,’” Underwood recalled.
That prompted him to get his Master’s in Educational Leadership in 2011. In Underwood’s fifth and final year at Rayville, he was named Teacher of the Year for Richland Parish. Then, he achieved his first goal – becoming a math teacher at Ouachita in 2013.
Underwood spent 6 years in the classroom, earning Teacher of the Year honors, adapting to curriculum shifts like Common Core and even interviewed for the Ouachita Junior High principal position 6 years ago prior to getting it.
“I would say from 2015 to basically now, I have been prepared for the instructional challenge for the way they (the state) wanted things taught,” said Underwood, referring to Common Core being introduced in 2015. “Going through so many adjustments has allowed me to see the best in everything we are adjusting to which has been a tool in the toolbox along the way.”
The only thing missing was experience on the administrative level. Underwood left Ouachita in 2019 and spent one year at East Ouachita Middle School as an administrative assistant. That spring COVID hit and by August, he was back at Ouachita High School as an assistant principal, learning to adjust once again.
“Our job as educators is to constantly seek better practices that will reach the next generation,” Underwood said. “We are always supposed to be improving what we do.”
Where some people see change as a hard thing to grasp, Underwood embraces it. With curriculum adjustments in mathematics over the years, it’s almost become second nature to him, which will bode well as he embraces a new set of students and a new faculty – 20 percent of which Underwood said will be in their first year at Ouachita Junior High.
“The main thing I want them to understand is they are supported,” Underwood said. “I know what it feels like when you have the information guzzling down your throat. At some point, you have to stop and look at that person in the face and say, ‘Hey, just come in and do a good job. I’ll be there the whole way.’”
Underwood is ready for the school year and has his immediate goals – three to be exact – already laid out. The first is communication between the school and the community. He wants parents to know what is going on inside the halls at Ouachita Junior High.
Second, as an alum of Ouachita, he wants to foster a culture that represents what Lion pride should be about.
“Our students will make mistakes, but it is on us to teach them accountability in order to improve,” Underwood said.
In the classrooms, Underwood is focusing on closing the gap in Math and ELA (English Language Arts).
“The curriculum that our students use is different from what parents are used to,” Underwood said. “Let’s work together to get them the help needed to overcome these obstacles. Obviously test scores, but it’s making sure that our students are supported. It’s looking to put structures in place, so that we can figure out how to grow our student population.”
THE UNDERWOOD FILE
2007 – Richwood Middle School
2008-2013 – Rayville High School
2013-2019 – Ouachita Parish High School
2019-2020 – East Ouachita Middle School, Administrative Assistant
2020-2023 – Ouachita Parish High School, Assistant Principal
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