“It’s okay to fail, as long as you fail forward, because we learn from failures. If nobody ever failed, if nobody was ever challenged, then we would never grow.” This is what Mr.Hackett responded when asked what advice he would give to the students of Dee-Mack High School.
He went on to say, “Enjoy the four years you have at Dee-Mack, but it is four years for a reason. It’s time to move on, and it’s time to go live your life, and, like I said, go do great things”. Mr. Hackett is going into his fourth and final year at Dee-Mack High School as the superintendent and will be returning to East Peoria High School, where he began his education career.
Mr. Hackett started his career by majoring in business and working as the business manager for Eastlight Theatre in East Peoria for 11 years. While he thoroughly enjoyed this job as he enjoys working in business and his main hobby is performing in and watching musical theater, he decided he wanted to move into a career in which he could grow in his career. Luckily for him, a job at East Peoria High School opened up as a bookkeeper. While working at East Peoria, he ended up taking on both the speech coach position as well as the music director for the school musical position, re-sparking his love for working with high school students. With the support of his superintendent, Chuck Nagel, who Mr. Hackett now looks back on as his main role model and the person who taught him how to be a superintendent, Mr. Hackett decided to go back to school to become a superintendent.
His first administrative job was working at Dunlap High School as the assistant superintendent under superintendent Dr. Scott Dearman, who had moved there from Dee-Mack. When the superintendent job at Dee-Mack opened up, Dr. Dearman was the one who told Mr. Hackett about the opening and encouraged him to apply for the job. Funnily enough, the job had also opened up 3 years prior, just as Mr. Hackett had applied for the assistant superintendent position at East Peoria, and he hadn’t put in for it because he didn’t think it was the right timing. About this, he said “Timing is everything and everything ended up exactly as it was supposed to be”.
When asked about his time at Dee-Mack, Mr.Hackett had many fond memories to look back on. Something unique he’d noticed about the Dee-Mack Community was the strong sense of community that this district maintains. He remembers Coach Myers asking him his first year if he missed working at a big school, and while there were certain things he missed, there are certain things, like the homecoming cookout, that he really enjoys doing and would never have been able to do at a big school. The community support and the way the Dee-Mack community rallies together really sticks out to him.
Coming into the district, Mr. Hackett started with one main goal: to study and observe the inner workings of our district and make connections. After learning about our district, his main goal became advancing our district in academics. This is a goal he worked to achieve by hiring a full time curriculum director this past summer. In his day to day life, Mr. Hackett’s main goal is to be trustworthy and kind.
Mr. Hackett’s favorite thing about Dee-Mack is the students. In the past, he hasn’t always had an office within a school building. Here at Dee-Mack, his office is in the high school building, allowing him to interact more with high school students and high school life.
Mr. Hackett has also thoroughly enjoyed working with the staff of the district, which is very apparent in hearing what his coworkers have to say about him. Mrs. Wingfield, his secretary, said, “I have seen Mr. Hackett impact our community and district in so many ways. He has such a positive attitude in every task that is thrown at him. He has built such great partnerships with businesses, organizations, staff, students and parents who help support our school district. He does a great job with communication and engaging with the staff, students and the public” when asked about her boss. Her comment on his partnerships with staff is corroborated by Mr. Davis who describes Mr. Hackett was “contagiously positive” and speaks highly of his willingness to help others and his priority to provide our students with motivational and loving teachers and coaches.
Beyond his love for his work, Mr. Hackett also has a strong love for theater, which is the main hobby he is still intentionally finding time to be involved in. While it is technically a part of his job, he also views attending youth sporting events as a hobby as he thoroughly enjoys doing that as well.
Mr. Hackett will be missed by the Dee-Mack community, as highlighted by the student council’s choice to have him be the 2024 Homecoming Grand Marshall. We wish him the best of luck in the rest of his career and encourage him to, as he would say, “Go do great things”.
