Director of Marietta school “success” center retires

April 20, 2017 Marietta - Leigh Colburn (right), director of the Graduate Marietta Student Success Center, talks to Jose Mena, student behavior program specialist from Fulton County Schools, while he tours the center, which is in Marietta High School. Educators from across Georgia have visited the center, hoping to find ideas they can copy to improve student performance. HYOSUB SHIN / HSHIN@AJC.COM

Credit: Hyosub Shin

Credit: Hyosub Shin

April 20, 2017 Marietta - Leigh Colburn (right), director of the Graduate Marietta Student Success Center, talks to Jose Mena, student behavior program specialist from Fulton County Schools, while he tours the center, which is in Marietta High School. Educators from across Georgia have visited the center, hoping to find ideas they can copy to improve student performance. HYOSUB SHIN / HSHIN@AJC.COM

Leigh Colburn, the founder of the new Graduate Marietta Student Success Center, is retiring from Marietta City Schools, which will be searching for a new center director.

It might seem a contradiction, but Colburn said she can do more for the center -- and for spreading the concept across the state -- as an independent operator.

“Since I’m guaranteed a retirement salary, I can be a little bit more of a risk-taker,” said Colburn, who resigned two years ago as the longtime principal at Marietta High School to establish the center inside the school.

It offers traditional academic tutoring but also a host of less traditional services in a school, from mental health counselors and family protective workers to food and clothes, nearly all of it paid for or provided by outside agencies and nonprofit organizations. The center caught the attention of lawmakers, who brought Colburn to the Capitol to speak in the spring. At least a couple of hundred schools and organizations have sent emissaries for a tour.

Colburn will be affiliated with the Marietta Schools Foundation as she continues to raise money for the center and to coordinate with outside partners. She’ll also establish a separate company, The Centergy Project, to spread the concept and details of the Success Center to other school districts.

The pace of visits to the center has increased, from a couple per week to as many as six a week. That leaves Colburn with little time to actually run the center. That’s why she wants to cede the job to someone else while she takes on the outreach role.

Centergy will consult with other school districts that want to start their own center.

Colburn, who's in demand these days, will be speaking about her center on June 21 at the Georgia Department of Education's conference on federal programs and funding. Changes in federal law will allow more flexible use of federal education dollars, which means the money could help pay for the kind of work done at the Success Center.

>>Read more about the Graduate Marietta Student Success Center at myAJC.com.