St. George's School Names First Woman Head

MIDDLETOWN, RI — She's the first and the twelfth. Alexandra “Alixe” Callen has been named the twelfth Head of St. George’s School, the Board of Trustees announced. She is the first woman to be tapped to lead the private co-ed prep school.

Callen is currently upper school director at Lakeside School in Seattle. She will leave that post next June and take over at St. George's on July 1.

She has family and professional ties to the school and to New England,according to Leslie B. Heaney, head of the Board of Trustees.

"Alixe served as the principal at Acton-Boxborough Regional High School in Acton, Massachusetts, from 2008-2013 and as an assistant principal of Needham High School in Needham, Massachusetts, from 2004-2008," said Heaney and Tad Van Nordern, head of the search committee.

"During those years, she lived on campus at Middlesex with her husband and their sons, Zander and Miles, now 18 and 14 years old. She served as a dorm parent alongside her husband, James “Ace” Bailey, during his tenure as Middlesex’s Assistant Director of Admission. As such, Alixe already has strong ties to New England — and incidentally to the Hilltop, as four of her relatives graduated from St. George’s: her great-grandfather, Johns H. Congdon ’03; grandfather, James B. Congdon ’41; great uncle, Charles B. Congdon ’40; and uncle, James B. Congdon Jr. ’66."

Callen graduated from Milton Academy. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Brown University, along with a master’s degree and a doctorate from Harvard University, they said.

She takes over a school that has been engulfed in a sex scandal that became public earlier this year. An inquiry revealed that at least 61 students were sexually abused in the 70s and 80s by staff members, including abuse from one employee that was so rampant that the victim told investigators that they couldn't see how other adults at the school couldn't be aware of it.

“My entire career has been spent helping teenagers to be kind, to watch out for each other, and to be contributing community members,” she said. “To now do that work in a school that has such deep roots for my family makes me humble and proud.”

Dan Libon contributed to this report

Courtesy Photo St. George School