Angela Calamari sees St. Katharine School as positive force

Angela Calamari was attracted to St. Katharine School in Baltimore because she saw it as a school that can be a positive force in the community. Strengthening that community presence is a big part of the new principal’s agenda.

This summer, St. Katharine offered a flea market open to the community and there will be a back-to-school picnic. Area legislators and other leaders have been invited to the opening day of school. The principal also plans to initiate a service club in the school.

“I want to bring the joy of learning to the children,” said Ms. Calamari, a New York native who served 18 years as a teacher at Resurrection-St. Paul School in Ellicott City. “When they enjoy coming to school, they learn.”

The school is updating its restroom plumbing, improving its library and repainting walls for the new school year, Ms. Calamari said. Her colleagues at Resurrection-St. Paul gave her a farewell gift of 1,000 new library books to be donated to her new school.

Ms. Calamari, a parishioner of Church of the Resurrection in Ellicott City, holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Queens College in Jamaica, New York, and state certification from State University of New York at Stony Brook. Ms. Calamari is certified in education administration from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and holds certification and a master’s degree in reading and special education from Loyola College in Maryland, Baltimore.

Ms. Calamari helped write the Success for All curriculum in science at Johns Hopkins University. She is the former director of the GED program at St. Ambrose Outreach Center in Baltimore and has taught in New York and New Hampshire Catholic schools.

St. Katharine has an enrollment of 250 and is part of the Queen of Peace Cluster School with Ss. James and John.