Eric Baugher: Strengthening Systems That Support Student Success | by TEM

Leadership in education rarely begins with a single defining moment. More often, it develops through experience, through listening, adapting, and staying committed to the work even when the path forward is not yet fully clear. For Eric Baugher, that path has been shaped by a steady focus on meeting students’ needs and strengthening systems that support their success.

After earning his Master of Education from the University of Findlay in Ohio, Baugher, a native Ohioan, was prepared to teach social studies. But local opportunities were limited, and staying close to his family farm mattered just as much as starting his career. He accepted a long-term substitute position at Tiffin Columbian High School in Ohio, stepping into a Career-Based Intervention (CBI) classroom.

It was not meant to last, yet the experience shifted something. The students he worked with did not always fit within the traditional system, and the work demanded more than standard teaching. It required patience, adaptability, and a deeper understanding of what holds students back.

When the program was discontinued, Baugher chose not to walk away from that space. Instead, he joined the North Central Ohio Educational Service Center, beginning a twelve-year stretch that would shape his approach to alternative education. Over time, he moved across roles as a CBI teacher, an educator in an alternative school, and later an Intervention Specialist. Each setting revealed the same pattern. Some students were not failing the system; the system was failing them.

A visit to New Leaf organization’s school in Mansfield, part of its Buckeye Community Schools network in Ohio, brought that realization into focus. The New Leaf dropout prevention and credit recovery (DOPR) model felt aligned with the work he had been moving toward all along. He joined soon after, first in Marion, then as Principal in Mansfield, and later as Director of Northern Operations. There was no single turning point. Just a series of decisions to stay close to the work that mattered.

(The Education Magazine) | READ THE FULL ARTICLE »