After 19 years, Maplesville High Principal Maggie Hicks’ career in the Chilton County School System will end June 30.

Hicks resigned as MHS principal to fill a position with the Alabama State Department of Education in the assessment department starting July 1.

Hicks’ resignation was posted and approved at the Chilton County Board of Education meeting June 18.

“I’m excited for the new opportunity, but I’ll be sad to leave here,” Hicks said. “I’m going to miss Maplesville. It’s bittersweet right now.”

As an employee in the state’s assessment department, Hicks said she will be involved in reviewing and editing the tests given each year to all grades in Alabama’s public schools.

Hicks said she would continue to live in Chilton County and commute to Montgomery for work.

Hicks’ career in education started when she was hired at MHS as an aide in 1994.

In March 2002, she was hired as assistant principal at Thorsby High School, where she met now-MHS Vice Principal Roger Sheffield.

Sheffield was starting as a sixth grade teacher at Thorsby the same year Hicks was leaving for the MHS principal position.

“When I started at Thorsby, she introduced me to my first classroom at Thorsby,” Sheffield said. “I thank her for her leadership, her guidance, her mentoring me and [she has] just done an outstanding job for training people for the next level.”

After serving for three years as assistant principal at Thorsby, Sheffield joined Hicks at Maplesville as vice-principal.

The two have worked together ever since, and Sheffield said he will hold onto Hicks’ ability to “see the big picture” and keep the best interests of her students as her top priority.

“All of her decision-making has been based on that,” Sheffield said. “It’s not always easy to see the big picture. All her decisions are based on the students first. She will truly be missed for sure.”

Hicks said her primary goal as Maplesville’s new principal was to familiarize herself with the current status of both the school and surrounding community.

“I knew I couldn’t please everyone, but I tried to make decisions based on the majority,” Hicks said. “We are in the kid business, and we’re not going to please everyone all the time, but you would hope that you would do the best for all those involved.”

Although she is excited to see what lies ahead for her, Hicks said she would miss her faculty members she called “family” and the students that filled the hallways of her home away from home.

“I’m grounded in my faith and know that God leads me to make the decisions I have made,” Hicks said. “I just feel very blessed to have had this opportunity, and I’m looking forward to the next opportunities I do have. I’m going to miss Maplesville dearly.”