At its recent meeting, the Bartlesville Board of Education approved the appointments of two Assistant Principals for the 2025-26 school year.
Gretchen Watson has been named Assistant Principal at Bartlesville High School, where she has served as a dedicated educator and leader since 2014. With ten years of experience as a mathematics teacher, she also served for three years as the secondary math department chair and for one year as a 9th and 10th grade counselor. Watson was honored as the district’s Secondary Rookie of the Year in 2015 and was selected as Bartlesville High School’s Teacher of the Year in 2023.
Watson earned her Master’s in Educational Leadership from Southeastern Oklahoma State University in 2023. She resides in Bartlesville with her husband, and their children attend Richard Kane Elementary School. Their oldest son graduated from Bartlesville High School in 2020.
Cheron Southwick has been appointed Assistant Principal at Madison Middle School. She brings 25 years of teaching experience, including 19 years at the middle school level. Southwick previously served in Bartlesville Public Schools for a decade as a teacher, counselor, and administrator. During her time as a classroom teacher, she contributed to student success on End-of-Instruction Algebra I tests.
Southwick stepped away from administration last year to support her daughter and son-in-law during her granddaughter’s health challenges. Now that her granddaughter is thriving, Southwick is eager to return to an administrative role and help guide students to success once again. She and her husband have four children who graduated from Bartlesville High School, and their youngest daughter will be an eighth grader at Madison Middle School during the 2025-26 school year.