Cass Technical high school's Lisa Phillips becomes the first Detroit principal to win Principal of the Year for the state of Michigan.
Under Phillips’ leadership of seven years as principal at Cass Tech, the school was named an International Bacalaureate school, and it is the only public high school in Detroit and Wayne County to receive this designation, according to the awards program.
“I honor my savior,” Phillips told her wellwishers attending the ceremony. “This is the work that I was put here to do. I follow the lead for the one who I praise, and He makes this OK for all of us."
“To be the first, it makes me so proud," she said. "Everything I do is a ‘we’ thing, it’s what we do here in Detroit."
“Lisa Phillips has been the true embodiment of an exceptional principal,” said Wendy Zdeb, executive director of the Michigan Association of Secondary School Principals. “Every day, she works to make the 2,500 students and staff members in this building feel like a family.”
Deborah Jenkins, principal of Martin Luther King Jr. Senior High School and a member of the MASSP board, acknowledge the historic significance of a Detroit principal receiving the honor and congratulated Phillips on the honor.
“Not only have we had a longstanding professional career together for more than 20 plus years, but a friendship that goes much longer,”