WS Chronicle

Three new principals have been hired by the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education.

Teresa Dees will be the principal of Vienna Elementary; Pam Helms has been hired to lead Kernersville Middle; and Freda Smith will be the new principal at Northwest Middle.

Dees, who replaces Patrick Mitze, has been the assistant principal of Vienna since 1997. She has worked as a curriculum coordinator at South Fork Elementary School and a classroom teacher at Clyde Campbell Elementary School in Catawba County and Ibraham, Southwest and Walkertown elementary schools in Forsyth County.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from Appalachian State University and a master’s degree in school administration from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Helms, who  replaces Sharon Porter, has been the principal of Oakwood Elementary School in Hickory since 2012, and she was named Principal of the Year for Hickory City Schools in 2012.

Previously, Helms worked as a middle school principal for nine years in Hickory, Elkin and Iredell-Statesville schools districts. She earned a bachelor’s degree in music from Appalachian State University and a master’s degree in school administration and doctorate in educational leadership from Gardner-Webb University.

Smith, who replaces Ingrid Medlock, has been an assistant principal at Reynolds High School since 2011.

Smith also worked as an assistant principal for at Atkins High School from 2009 to 2011 and as the school coordinator for Atkins’ School of Computer Technology from 2005 to 2009. She also served as the technology education instructor at Walkertown Middle School, where she was named the school’s Teacher of the Year in 2002.

Smith earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from Winston-Salem State University and a master’s degree in school administration and a master’s degree in technology education from N.C. A&T State University.