New principal, an experienced educator, at St. Anna Elementary School

By Tanya Connor
The Catholic Free Press
 
Tricia Brzenk – a teacher and pre-school director – had prepared to be a Catholic school leader. But her induction to becoming principal at St. Anna Elementary School in Leominster involved the unexpected.
“This is my first year as a principal,” said Mrs. Brzenk. “It’s definitely challenging, but exciting. I was hired the week before school started.”
Mrs. Brzenk said she accepted the position Aug. 24. Teachers returned on Aug. 28 and students on Aug. 30.
On Sept. 11, after she left school for the day, a teacher locking up reported that water was pouring down the school’s stairs.
Father Carlos Ruiz, pastor of St. Anna Parish, said there were four inches of water in the main building’s cafeteria/art room and a foot of water in the basement of the preschool building behind it.
He said Mrs. Brzenk used kindness and common sense to handle the situation, and he told her she was already “fully initiated.”
It was “exhausting,” Mrs. Brzenk admitted. But she said it helped her learn about getting through adversity and “you realize [there are] all these people you can rely on.”
She praised Marian Priddy, St. Anna’s secretary of 32 years, for helping her keep families and staff informed of progress and plans.
Mrs. Brzenk has many years of experience in education. She has a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from SUNY Oneonta, state university of New York, and a master’s degree in education from American International College in Springfield, she said. 
She said she taught pre-kindergartners for three years in two different early childhood education centers before starting her 21-year career in Catholic education, first by teaching kindergarten at St. Ann School in Somerville for three years. 
When St. Ann’s closed, she went to St. Bridget School in Framingham, where she was a kindergarten and first-grade teacher and pre-school director. She worked there 18 years, until 2022. For the 2022-2023 school year she taught in the early learning center at the Fay School in Southborough.
Mrs. Brzenk said she participated in an aspiring leaders program through the Archdiocese of Boston, which gave her insights about being a Catholic school administrator.
Why are Catholic schools important to her?
“I love sharing my faith with others,” Mrs. Brzenk said. “I love going to Mass with the students and teachers. We go once a week. … We go as a school” - pre-kindergartners through eighth-graders at St. Anna’s.
“My hope is to support the staff … engage with the students, and to share the mission of St. Anna School with the community” – the mission of fostering empathy, kindness and service to others –Mrs. Brzenk said. 
When the school choir sang, “They’ll know we are Christians by our love” at Mass, “I challenged the students … to show [by] their actions, not just their words, that the St. Anna’s students are helpful and kind,” she said. 
The new principal also makes time for personal interests. She said she loves to read and walk: “I like the outside.”  
The family got their dog, Riley, to be a walking companion for her, but the mixed-breed rescue is afraid to leave the driveway. No matter; Mrs. Brzenk said she takes daily walks with her husband, David. Their son, Jack, is a senior at Assabet Valley Regional Technical High School in Marlborough, where the family lives. 
Mrs. Brzenk said she is a member of St. Bridget Parish in Framingham and also attends St. Matthias Parish in Marlborough. Since Jack attended St. Bridget’s School from pre-kindergarten through grade 8 when his mother worked there, Mrs. Brzenk got to be a Catholic school parent too.
She grew up attending public schools in New York, she said. Her husband is also from New York and is now executive director of a before-and-after-school program in Belmont.
As a long-time parent and teacher in Catholic schools, Mrs. Brzenk wants to show St. Anna’s parents and teachers that she has been through the same things they experience. 
“She’s a blessing,” Father Ruiz said. “I just want her to be a good Catholic leader, guiding the school in faith and kindness. And she has done it so far.”