New principal to focus on literacy development in Gateway's Ramsey Elementary School

Joseph Rosi is emphasizes literacy development as he takes over as principal of Ramsey Elementary in the Gateway School District.

Rosi, after being approved during a school board meeting Sept. 27, started his tenure at Ramsey on Oct. 18. Coming from a background that includes teaching kindergarten and first grade, Rosi said he feels particularly prepared to help advance elementary-age children.

“Being a teacher, my first job out of school was actually teaching kindergarten,” Rosi said. “So, I think I’ve had some background there in terms of literacy development. That’s the primary goal of our initial first few years of teaching kids in the elementary school. We’re working with them to learn how to read.

“Because the pandemic has sort of challenged our ability to get in front of kids, it’s more critical than ever to keep working with our families and our primary teachers to make sure we’re getting kids moved along to meet our grade-level expectations. Just making sure that our literacy development as a whole is top-notch.”

Originally from Bethel Park, Rosi began as a teacher at Fairfax County Public Schools, in a suburb of Washington, D.C. He earned a Master of Science in Education from Duquesne University, as well as a graduate certificate in school principalship and administration from Point Park University.

Rosi returned to Bethel Park School District as an administrator. He most recently served as the assistant superintendent for the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh.

“Since I’ve kind of had a little bit of everything, I’ve had a lot of different jobs in education, I find that my skill set and interest really lends itself to the building principal position,” Rosi said. “I love being with kids and supporting teachers. An elementary environment, it’s awesome. … It’s really the only time where we’re getting a kid in a holistic manner where we’re nurturing them as they grow, but also helping them academically, socially, emotionally.

“It’s a lot of changes between when you’re 5 and you leave us when you’re 10. That’s a big difference for kids.”

That separates the role of an elementary school principal from one at a middle or high school, Rosi said. In addition to focusing on academic achievement, he said helping students progress emotionally is equally important.

“The social component … I think is just as equitable as academics. I want to build a sense of community with our kids,” Rosi said. “There’s no reason why we can’t have kids be a part of, and volunteering in, our community, recognizing the needs of Monroeville and then figuring out solutions to problems where they can help out their neighbor. I think instilling that in them in an early age is important because when they finally get out of school, when they leave us after 12 years, they’re going to be set up to be contributors to society and our community.”

Regarding academics, he would like to focus on basic computational and critical problem-solving skills in addition to literacy. Because of the covid-19 pandemic, Rosi said he thinks building that foundation became more difficult for elementary school teachers.

He said Ramsey is attempting to reinforce introductory elements of mathematics to prepare students to study pre-algebra and calculus in middle school.

“They have an interest in doing that as a district, obviously, because on the whole, all of our kids, including mine, I’m a parent of 5-year-old twins who just started kindergarten.

“So, I think I can come at this angle from a dual perspective with the experience that I have as a professional educator, but also a parent seeing I want my kids to continue to be competitive and move along academically. So, when I laid that out for them, we found it was of mutual interest.”