Completing the Dean Team
Principal Timothy Dee had a vision for an initiative that would take cura personalis on Prep’s campus to new heights, a plan that would ensure that no boys’ needs would fall through the cracks: a team of four assistant deans of students—one per class.
This past summer, that vision was fully realized with the addition of Elijah Langston to the staff, thanks to the generous support of donors like you. As assistant dean of students for the incoming class of 2028, Langston joins the three assistant deans who helped launch the new approach in the 2023-2024 academic year: Somadina Iworisha (Class of 2027), Nick Debarbrie (Class of 2026), and Jessica Lombardi (Class of 2025).
The assistant deans’ role is to walk with each class on their journey to graduation, making themselves present to the students in as many ways as possible—from greeting them in their class parking lots in the morning to acting as a trusted source of advice. Each assistant dean serves in additional roles that connect them with the wider school community, such as coordinating the student activities program, teaching a course, coaching a team, riding the train with students to away games, or thoughtfully discerning the leaders for the next Kairos retreat.
In his new role, Langston will assume management of the advisory program in addition to serving as an assistant coach for varsity football as well as track.
“The overall theme of support with this team of deans is exceptional. The level of support that Fairfield is able to provide students at a one-to-one level is not done in many places,” says Langston, who taught in two other schools and earned a master’s degree in educational leadership before joining Prep. “From a professional perspective, I’m not only ready and willing to take on the challenge, but I know I have help—other peers and colleagues with exceptional backgrounds in their fields whom I can lean on to inform the decisions I make and the relationships I build as a leader here.”
Debarbrie, who previously served as dean of students at the Jesuit-sponsored Cristo Rey New York High School, emphasizes meeting the students where they are and sums up the role this way: “It’s all about relationships. The high school experience is a time of growth. There’s going to be moments of growth that are great and moments of growth that are challenging. The exciting piece is that we get to be with them on that journey and help them encounter the experience.”
Prior to joining the team, Iworisha most recently served as assistant principal for a charter school in Cleveland, Ohio. She elaborates on the concept of the whole child at the heart of the dean team approach, “We understand that these are not just students. They’re someone’s friend, child, or grandchild. They’re athletes. They are complex and there’s a lot going on. It’s important to get to know them, for them to know us, and to build on that.”
Perhaps the best measure of the impact of the assistant deans is their reception by the students. Lombardi, who was responsible for both the junior and senior classes in 2023-2024, stepped into the role after teaching English at Prep for several years. She observes how her students started coming to her when they’d made a poor choice before she’d even heard about it. The Class of 2024, her first class to graduate, chose to dedicate the yearbook to her, whom they described as “a student body favorite” and acknowledged as “a faculty member who has shown exemplary care for the students of our school, as well as someone who fully commits themselves to what it means to be a Jesuit teacher and mentor.”
Lombardi concludes, “Our completed team of deans allows us to care for the whole boy—mind, body, and spirit—within our common home with the utmost love, compassion, and commitment.”