Shaler Area High School has seen many new things since the start of this school year. One of the most notable being new assistant principal Mr. Ryan Duane, who stepped up to the position after formerly working as a chemistry teacher in Virginia.
From the start of his time working here, Mr. Duane has loved the atmosphere of the Shaler Area High School community.
“Everybody here has been extremely helpful, nice, and patient. All the things that you could hope for as somebody coming into a new school, it’s been that way here,” he said.
Working in a school was not always what he wanted to do, originally going to the University of Pittsburgh for biology.
“My game plan was to do my undergrad in biology and then go to medical school,” Mr. Duane said.
After graduating from Pitt, he started working at an orthopedic office, before looking for medical schools that intrigued him.
“I decided, I’m going to pick the most fun one possible. I’m going to pick the one that’s in Texas. So I moved to San Antonio for medical school,” he said.
Mr. Duane quickly realized that the medical field was not something that excited him. After looking around at the other students in his program, he understood that this was not his true passion.
“I regrouped and I thought, ‘Okay, so that’s not my cup of tea, but what really gets me excited?’ The same way that I saw those people getting excited. The kind of memories that I kept thinking of were any times where I was working with kids, particularly high school kids,” he said.
The first step to Mr. Duane’s new plan was to go back to school for education.He went back to Pitt and got his Masters degree in secondary science education. After graduating, Duane made the decision to move to Virginia to start his new career as a teacher.
During his six years of teaching, Duane was looking for more leadership opportunities.
“I was our assistant athletic director for a year, and I was our dean of students for a half a year. I enjoyed both of those experiences, I thought that this does feel right,” he said.
While working in Virginia, Mr. Duane got married to a teacher who also grew up outside of Pittsburgh. Both Duane and his wife always had the goal to eventually move back home to Pittsburgh.
“We got married a little over a year ago and decided now is the time if we’re going to kind of settle down and want to start a family and be back closer to our family, it’s time to move back home. So this summer, we just took the big leap,” he said.
Duane knew that this was the perfect opportunity to get a job in a high school leadership position. After interviewing at many schools in the area, he knew that Shaler Area was the right fit for him.
“In all of the meetings with Shaler there was something different about it. I could definitely tell right away at the beginning of the interview process,” he said. “I was extremely happy to accept and be here,” said Mr. Duane.
Mr. Duane knows that his experience has given him some perspective that he wants to share with the students at his new school.
“If you are really passionate about something, do that and do it to the best of your ability. The security and the money and everything that comes with that will naturally follow, if it’s really something you’re passionate about. So figure out what that passion is and follow it, and then live it and breathe it every single day,” he said.
