The position for Meg Licht, the associate principal for student services, goes farther than just the title given. She also oversees the student service department: the deans, nurses, the school counselors, the social workers, psychologists, the prevention and wellness coordinator, and anything to do with security at North (hall monitors, cafeteria monitors, security guards).

Mrs. Licht was a teacher in Milwaukee before applying to be a teacher at Central before North was built. Since North was new, the school needed new staff.

“When I first started in 2004, I came from Milwaukee Public Schools. I was a dance teacher and there was an opening at Grayslake Central, and I applied for that. Once North was on the brink of opening, they moved me there,” Licht said.

Mrs. Licht finds the experiences at North as her favorite thing about the community at North.

“I love all the different opportunities for experience kids get, all the different sports, clubs, and activities. When I went to high school, we didn’t have half as much as that. I feel like there’s got to be something for everybody. I think that’s our goal of 100 percent participation,’’ Licht said. “I think it’s all the experiences that students should have. Last year we didn’t have a Homecoming, and many of our sophomores lost some time in eighth grade, and it really affects people.”

This year her job had been to help staff is prepare for the incoming freshman class of 2026. Seeing as there was a pandemic, the current eighth graders were deprived of a full middle school experience, which is vital for helping students be ready for a good high school experience.

“With new kids coming in, naturally time management is a hard skill to learn. That’s why we’re really working on retraining,” Licht said.

With the new block scheduling, classes are long, but the breaks/lunches are also long. Students are given a large amount of freedom. Staff like Mrs. Licht prepares for the year and the next, coming up with ways to make sure behavior stays on the right track.

“A lot of us kind of forgot how to do school, so our biggest thing was retraining everyone, students and even staff on how to do school, building norms, making sure to be aware of what’s happening in the hallways and attendance. COVID did change the initial dynamic at North ultimately shifting our experiences,” Licht said.

The nurses were also put through a tough year when COVID first hit.

“The hardest thing is when COVID first started everything was changing so fast for them, so they were involved in a lot of meetings. And there were only two of them. I was really only there to support them because they had a lot of questions coming in or sometimes there’d be angry parents, so my main goal was to be their support system,” Licht said.