“I want them to know that even though I have a title and responsibility, I’m just a normal guy,” said Mr. Jeff Fritchtnitch, new MV superintendent.

It’s Mr. Jeff Frichtnitch’s first year as MV’s superintendent and he is doing everything he can to make Mount Vernon a safe space to attend school.

“Student safety and well being, socially growing, emotionally growing, and educationally growing, that would be our number one goal. Making sure that when people come to school here they feel like it’s a safe environment, making sure that if they see something, hear something they can come to any adult and we will address it immediately,” Mr. Fritchtnitch said.  

“I’ll be honest, we’ve already had that this year where students have come to us and we’ve intervened. You know it’s just really nice because I spoke about that on the opening day assembly too. It’s about relationships and making sure that we take care of one another and we’ve been seeing a lot of that in the first five, six weeks of school,” added Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Recently, in the past couple of years MV has made a transition from the ACT and now offers the SAT.

“[Academically], Mount Vernon Township High school hasn’t scored really well the last two to three years. I know we went from the ACT to the SAT, and  I know that a test on a couple of days or a day is not a true reflection of what goes on here, but we also have realized as a school district that we’ve had a lot of teachers come and a lot of teachers leave, administrators come, administrators leave. When you don’t have consistency in your teaching staff and when you don’t have consistency in your leadership for the building and you don’t have consistency in your board of education things can get discombobulated. So really our focus is let’s look at where we’ve been and let’s start to create a plan about where we’re going to go,” said Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Mr. Fritchtnitch is married to Julie, and together the have four kids, and a grandchild on the way, but Mr. Fritchtnitch has multiple hobbies that he partakes in on the weekends.
“We like to bike, we like to walk, we swim, and I enjoy hunting. I am an avid deer hunter, [My wife] Julie, I, and the kids we love to fish. Two of my three boys enjoy hunting, I’m going to be a grandpa next Thursday. My daughter is going to have our first grandchild, and his name is James,” stated Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Mr. Fritchtnitch is also a man of faith, who is highly involved in his church.

I go to church, as a matter of fact this Sunday [September 23] I am preaching at our church because our pastor is going to be gone. My wife is the praise team leader so I play in the praise band and then I sing in the praise band, [Julie] is the piano player. I am an elder at church and I volunteer with different groups, organizations, and things at church. So we have time, but we also like to serve people,” added Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Mr. Fritchnitch and his wife also try to take time for themselves when they’re not at church or with their family.

“We also take time for ourselves, when Julie wants to go shopping I always tease her I just say ‘Yup, today I’m Driving Ms. Daisy.’ I sit there while she tries on clothes and I sit there and say ‘yes I like that’ or ‘no I don’t like that’,” said Mr. Fritchtnitch

Mr. Fritchtnitch also has a strong bond with his parents.

“We go visit our parents and their both getting older so our time is more precious with them. They’re both getting older so our time with them is more precious, they’re our parents so we go see them on a regular basis also,” stated Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Homecoming theme is The Greatest Showman, about which Mr. Fritchtnitch is especially excited.

“Honestly I was thinking how do I get a tuxedo and look like the ringmaster, but [in all seriousness], there’s a lot of things that can come from that, themes and dressing up. A circus is a very fun, exciting, eye opening [experience], there’s so many things that happen at the circus. If you’ve never been to one, when the trapeze people are going and the have the horses going around [them] there’s so much to watch and see, that’s pretty exciting right? It kinda takes you back to being a little kid and some of our greatest memories are when we are children. I think it’s a cool theme and I think there is going to be a lot of fun to be had. [The bonfire] is going to be really cool [as well],” added Mr. Fritchtnitch.

Mr. Fritchtnitch is also excited about the progress the football team is making this year and he enjoys watching some of the practice film of the football team is his free time to relax. In his free time he also enjoys to read, mow his lawn, and catch up with his kids.

Mr. Fritchtnitch believes MV is amazing and that it has a lot of potential. He’s been to a lot of schools, but he says he’s only seen one other school that cares about the students/ teachers as much as this school does. Mr. Fritchtnitch wants this school to look at the positives and stop focusing on the negatives.