Brown County High School Principal Matt Stark is leaving the school district to serve as the principal of Bloomington High School North.

The Monroe County Community School Corporation Board of School Trustees approved a two-year contract for Stark at their meeting last night.

The first day of school in Brown County is Aug. 4. Stark said he will be there to greet Brown County High School students on the front steps, as his start date at Bloomington North has not been finalized yet.

Stark has been principal at Brown County High School since 2018, but this was not his first stint in that job. He was hired right out of Purdue University to teach social studies at Brown County, taught for 10 years, then was principal at the high school for another 10 years. He left the district in 2013 to take a principal job at Urbana High School in Illinois.

In 2018, he returned to Brown County High School to be principal here once again. He lives in Monroe County.

“I have 23 years of a professional career in Brown County, in a community I love and adore. This is completely a professional decision for my career. This is not anything against the board or the community or anything,” Stark said.

“I love Brown County and that has not changed, but professionally this is a good move in talking with some people about my professional career and what’s next for me. This became a good next step.”

How and when his successor will be chosen has not been announced yet. Stark said he will be involved at any level they wish in helping with the transition and finding his replacement.

Brown County Schools also is undergoing a leadership change in the superintendent’s office; the school board hired Emily Tracy from Wabash City Schools as BCS superintendent last week. Her first day is Aug. 2.

Read more in next week’s Democrat.