CEDAR HILL — Elementary Principal Dwight Perry is the educator who believes it is important to be a mixture of stern and silly, depending on the situation.
As the leader of High Pointe Elementary in Cedar Hill, it’s his mission to make learning fun for the more than 300 students under his care. To make the last couple of days of the 2022-2023 school year engaging for his students, he held a cooking competition.
Third, fourth and fifth-grade classes got the chance to submit breakfast recipes for Perry to cook and then present to a panel of five judges.
Fifth-grade student Robert Powell and his classmates had principal Perry make breakfast crepes. They watched in excitement as Perry mixed crepe batter during a live broadcast to his classroom via iPad.
“You’ll never guess what they’re so excited about,” said Powell’s teacher Karen Britt. “The class whose recipe is the judge’s favorite will get to come to school on the last day of the semester wearing ‘normal clothes’ and Crocs!”
Britt said this exercise isn’t just fun and games, it gives her students important applied learning skills. Powell and his fellow fifth graders, who normally wear uniforms to school, had high hopes their crepe recipe would win over the judges.
“Getting a room of fifth graders excited about learning isn’t always easy, but Principal Perry knows what he’s doing,” said guest judge Gayla Beaty.
Beaty owns Fluffy’s Chicken Restaurant, a local favorite in Cedar Hill according to Principal Perry.
“I’m in the cooking industry, so I loved seeing the creativity of the kids learning how to cook,” said Beaty. “Not only is it a fun competition but they’re learning at the same time.”
After trying the three dishes cooked by Principal Perry Beaty and her fellow judges chose the breakfast crepes as the winner.
“Making learning fun is my passion,” said Principal Perry as he and the judges listened to Powell’s class cheer and applaud with excitement. He couldn’t wait to congratulate Mrs. Britt’s class.
“Mr. Perry thinks out of the box on a lot of things,” said Powell with a big smile on his face. “He’s very creative!”
Principal Perry describes himself as a “Dynamic visionary and servant leader.”
Three of Perry’s core values are: accountability, belief, and continuous improvement. He’s a former high school math teacher, football, wrestling and girls’ soccer coach.
“I am often called ‘Coach’ Perry,” he said. “I try to bring my passions into what I do here it’s really about the kids. Getting them hyped and excited about doing something different something they’ve never experienced is fun for me.”
Perry said being a principal is the most challenging job he’s had thus far.
“This seat is the hardest seat I’ve ever had to sit in, it’s the hardest I’ve ever had to work, and I would do it 50 times over if I had to cause it’s not about me, it’s about the 326 that we serve here at High Pointe Elementary.”
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