Final bell to ring for principal, students of pioneering Landmark School in McHenry

One of Margaret Carey’s plans for retirement involves spending more time weaving, a hobby she picked up from her mother.

Carey, principal at McHenry Elementary School District 15‘s Landmark School, inherited a large floor loom from her mother, who died from cancer during the COVID-19 years. Always one to learn new things, Carey took classes at the Chicago School of Weaving to master that loom, adding, “I have been weaving ever since.”

Carey was weaving in a different way long before then. Married at 20, she left college before graduation to follow her new husband to his new job. They had two boys and then, as a young mother, wove together the challenges of earning her college degree while caring for her family.

“We had both of our boys, and when our youngest started kindergarten, I went to college full time,” Cary said.

“I graduated with a 4.0. I had to balance home and school” to make that happen, she said.

Later, she wove her teaching jobs around her husband’s work, which took the family across the country.

“We did the Great Tour of the Midwest,” with her husband, Tim, working in the paper industry. “We lived in Maine, Mississippi, New York, Iowa and Wisconsin,” and Carey found teaching jobs wherever they landed.

Later, a layoff prompted Tim to change careers, and the couple decided to focus on her career. Living in the Quad Cities area, Carey applied around northern Illinois to be closer to family and found the year-round program at Landmark.

Carey picked up master’s degrees along the way, too – one in curriculum and instruction and one in educational leadership. But she also had a unique perspective as a teacher and administrator because of her sons.

“I was a parent of a child with special needs, so I understood the parent perspective from the get-go,” Carey said.

Carey’s last day as a principal coincides with the last day of classes at the 130-year-old Landmark School. The District 15 board voted in July to close the school.

It was the year-round program, first offered at Landmark in 2001, that drew her to the school, Carey said. A school-of-choice for the district where attendance was picked via an application and lottery system, Landmark offers a shorter summer break but frequent, longer breaks throughout the school year.

“I love this calendar,” Carey said. Shorter summers mean needing less time reteaching following the break, as students have not been away long enough to forget what they’d learned the year before, she said.

“I think the frequent breaks keep learners and teachers fresh and eager,” Carey said.

Landmark has always been small, but District 15 also is very good at looking at a whole child individually, Carey said.

“One of the things I have always enjoyed at Landmark is that every student has always been welcome and accepted as an important member of our school community,” she said. “We have always accepted each student for who they are with their strengths or their unique challenges.”

That acceptance also is felt by her staff.

“She fosters a huge community there” that is different from anywhere else he’s worked, said Jake Burr, a third grade teacher at the school.

“Students, staff, custodians, bus drivers. She cares for everybody,” Burr said. “She exemplifies what a leader should be.”