Ms. Hilary Simmons

Ms. Simmons loves serving the Yokota Middle School White Tiger team. As the school principal, she dedicates herself to listening intently, leading by example, and remaining a lifelong learner. Ms. Simmons understands the importance of building community and plans to work alongside the Yokota Middle School team to ensure a safe and productive environment for students. She works to empower teachers while advancing the school’s vision, purpose, and goals. Ms. Simmons believes strongly that all students can learn through a collaborative, inclusive learning environment that incorporates standards-based instruction.

Ms. Simmons graduated from the University of West Florida with a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education in 2006. She advanced her educational career by earning a Master of Education in Curriculum and Instruction as well as a Master of Education in Educational Leadership all at the University of West Florida.

Ms. Simmons came from Germany, where she served as an assistant principal in the Grafenwoehr complex. During that time, she focused on offering professional development opportunities and support services to teachers, as well as created an environment where teachers were able to experiment, innovate, and lead. In addition, she worked toward continuous school improvement through promoting equitable learning opportunities for students to improve not only academia, but also support their social/emotional needs. Ms. Simmons worked closely with the CSI, CIL, and ISS teams to utilize data and resources to make meaningful goals for school improvement as well as worked alongside district leadership to provide learning opportunities for teachers and leaders related to district goals.

Ms. Simmons brings previous experience working in the Pacific East District. As a teacher in the Yokosuka complex, she enjoyed developing professional learning opportunities for teachers. She presented at the Teaching and Learning Conferences for the complex and through her role as the Site Literacy Lead teacher, she presented to colleagues on best practices for literacy instruction. Prior to joining the DoDEA family, she left the classroom after several years to become an Academic Intervention Specialist in Santa Rosa County Florida. This was an exciting move for her career due to her passion for providing tiered support of learning to students and her success as a teacher. Through this position she collaborated with a team of specialists and district leaders to implement a school-wide intervention program, procure curricular resources, deliver professional learning, and create school-wide literacy events. Santa Rosa County remains one of the top performing school districts in the state of Florida.

Ms. Simmons’ leadership philosophy is simple: to inspire teachers to empower young minds. She believes that persistence and perseverance is the key for both the teacher and student. She feels strongly that teachers have one of the most important jobs in society… to help shape our youth into strong and courageous individuals. She believes that using every minute of every day as a teachable moment is imperative not only with academia, but also with life lessons that will prepare students for life. She hopes to inspire teachers to feel this same way and consider their jobs as one of the most important jobs in the world.