Families To Be Reorganized, Staff Positions To Switch
By Andrew S. and Vic C.
Students, staff, and parents get ready: The Family Foundation School has a new look on the horizon.
For some time, Terry McCarthy has wanted to step down as Family Leader of Family Eight. Recently, Cindy Argiros decided to step down as female Family Leader of Family Three. And due to the economy, the school needs to reduce the number of families in the house. So on Tuesday, December 16, Family Eight will be dissolved and its members will join other families.
As the economy has declined, so has the number of enrollments. “We have to take steps to save money in order to preserve the school’s financial security,” said Rita Argiros, Vice President for Administrative Affairs. “We were looking for the least painful way to make the necessary changes,” she continued.
Family Eight was chosen for dissolution for several reasons. Terry McCarthy, while stepping down from his position as Family Leader, wished to remain a family counselor, but his wife Lindy wanted to remain a Family Leader.
With Cindy Argiros deciding to retire as Family Three Leader, and with Family Two needing a new family counselor, the perfect opportunity opened up for Terry and Lindy to keep the positions they wanted. All agreed that Family Eight would be the logical family to dissolve.
“Family Eight has represented the best of what Annie, Mike, and I want to see for The Family School,” Rita said. She is sure that the students and staff will carry the great aspects of Family Eight with them to their new families.
“We can say that 2008 was a year for revitalizing the family structures,” said Rita. “This has nothing to do with the school; it is really just the economy.”
Mike Argiros, FFS President and Chief Executive Officer, added, “Change is always difficult, but I also believe in change.”
As Family Eight staff and students prepare to join other families, students will be kept with their current sponsors. This will help students make the transition by ensuring that there’s someone familiar in their new environments.
Terry will continue to be the former Family Eight June graduates’ family counselor. The students’ responsibilities, such as buddy and shadowing and junior sponsoring, will be taken with them wherever they go. All set visits and graduations will remain the same; the only major change is the new environment.
The restructuring will include other changes. Family Five will be moving to the space that Family Eight occupied, giving them more room, and the Family Five quarters will become an all-purpose room to be used for study halls, meetings, and other functions which, in the past, would have required displacing one of the families for an evening.
Family Five also has new Family Leaders, Pete and Caren Jacques, as Pat Brown steps down to concentrate on her primary role as Spanish department chairperson, and as Tom Wood replaces Paul Geer as Family Leader for Family Six. Family Three’s Larry Patrisso will join Family Five as well.
Sylvia Gutowska will move from Family Five to Family Six. Myron Vandermark will move from Family Seven to become the family counselor for Family One.
All former Family Eight staff have been notified where they are going: John and Donna Broce are going to Family Five; Ed Leung, Frank Lucenti, and Alex and Shari Carroll are going to Family Four.
Jason Garner, Nellie Peters, and Dick Szczesh are joining Lindy McCarthy in Family Three. Connie Gotthardt will join Terry McCarthy in Family Two, Russ Mosher will go to Family One, Barb Thorbjornsson will go to Family Seven, and Archie Judd and Dawn Finlay will go to Family Six.
All of the students were successfully kept with their staff sponsors.
As Lindy McCarthy takes the place of Cindy Argiros in Family Three, Cindy, who has worked at FFS for 16 years, will leave her position to take care of her younger children, ages 8, 10, and 12, as they begin their middle school years.
Cindy believes that “God’s will for us is to be of service to others.”
She also thinks His will for her now is to take care of her children during these important developmental years.
Cindy is very happy with Lindy replacing her as Family Leader. “When I am in Lindy’s presence I feel more peaceful; she exudes a sense of serenity.” “God never gives us more than we can handle, and he helps us to handle what we are given,” said Mike Argiros.
He is more than confident that the former Family Eight students will do well with the transition, and that they will be of great service to the families they are going to join.
