Mount alumnus Alan Tenreiro returns to lead alma mater

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WOONSOCKET — For Alan Tenreiro, who begins his first academic year as president of Mount St. Charles Academy this fall, returning to the halls of Woonsocket’s nearly century-old Catholic high school is like returning home. A graduate, parent, former teacher and former board member, Tenreiro has remained close to the school throughout his years in educational administration and looks forward to being a part of the Mount community once more.

“I’m excited to be able to get out there and tell my Mount story to more than just friends who are at the house,” Tenreiro told Rhode Island Catholic during an interview at the school in August.

It wasn’t long after his graduation in 1992 that Tenreiro returned to his alma mater to coach boys’ soccer. Six years later, he was hired as a social studies and religion teacher, a position he would hold until his appointment as assistant principal at Smithfield High School in 2006. He went on to serve as principal at Cumberland High School, where his leadership in expanding coursework, improving college admissions rates and dramatically increasing the graduation rate earned him the distinction of 2016 National Principal of the Year.

His methods, Tenreiro said, focus less on strategies that target specific areas of school administration and more on developing a healthy, holistic school culture.

“Developing a culture in your students and team of adults, developing that community and work ethic around continual improvement, that is so important,” he said.

Tenreiro experienced the benefits of a strong culture of community while a student at Mount St. Charles, where he felt every student was known and cared for. That philosophy has remained with him throughout his educational career.

“I always tried to replicate so many of the cultural aspects of Mount St. Charles at the schools that I was at because the Mount culture had such a profound impact on me,” he said. “There’s a whole aspect around spiritual formation that kind of completes the whole student that we can focus on here.”

Returning to the foundations of that culture is one of his priorities for his upcoming tenure as president. As the second layperson to serve as president of a school founded by the Brothers of the Sacred Heart, Tenreiro hopes to preserve the tradition of the brothers by showcasing their history in exhibits around the school and integrating their teaching charism and spirituality into the religion curriculum.

“It’s also going to be about going back to some of the writings of the founders and talking with some of the students about how they themselves as students are living out that legacy,” he said.

Tenreiro’s appointment follows a sharp decline in enrollment as Mount St. Charles, like many area Catholic schools, struggles to remain an affordable and competitive alternative to public education. In moving the school forward, he hopes to increase the level of academic rigor and continue improvements to the school’s academic, athletic and fine arts facilities begun by his predecessor, Herve Richer Jr. The academy has also placed a new emphasis on its middle school grades, including the sixth grade, introduced in 2015, with the appointment of Jessie Butash as its first middle school principal.

“I’m just looking forward to getting to know the student body and seeing the new and the returning teachers come together and usher in this new era for Mount,” said Tenreiro. “I’m really excited for the team that we’ve created.”

Tenreiro earned his bachelor’s degree in social studies and master’s degree in educational administration from Rhode Island College and a certificate of advanced graduate study from Northeastern University. He and his family are parishioners of St. Teresa of the Child Jesus Church, Pawtucket.