As anyone will tell you, it’s the community that makes The New Century School what it is. Each individual community member offers their gifts to form a whole that’s greater than the sum of its parts. Even so, each single part is pretty special in its own right. Enter LaTriese Sussman. To know her is to know a hug in human form—she truly is the embodiment of warmth.

Born and raised in Baltimore, Ms. Sussman has spent her entire life caring for others. “I get it from my mother,” she explains. “She was the one who would give you the shirt off her back, and she passed it down to me as well.” That spirit of generosity has defined her path, from babysitting at age 12 to raising five children of her own, now ranging from ages 12 to 29, plus helping take care of her four grandkids, ages 1, 3, 6, and 11. Her brother jokingly calls her “that little old lady who lived in the shoe with all the kids.”

But it was her personal journey with one of her sons that truly shaped her calling. Born with two holes in his lung, he wasn’t getting adequate oxygen to the brain, leading to a disability. Doctors warned that life would only get harder as he grew older. “But as a parent, you’re like, ‘I can do it,'” she recalls. “And there were times I had those down days, those blue days. But I was like, ‘Nope,’ and I kept pushing for him.” Ms. Sussman, already deeply compassionate, became a fierce advocate for children, learning to balance love with the toughness her son needed to navigate the world. “I babied my son, and then I thought about it. I was like, ‘When I’m gone, the world’s not going to baby him.’ So I started to encourage more independence.” Her approach worked. Today, at 24, her son is employed and thriving. “When people say, ‘Maybe he’s not on the spectrum,’ I tell them he is, but it’s not who he is,” she says proudly. She taught him a lesson she now shares with every child who needs extra support: “Just because you’re on the spectrum, you don’t let it define you.”

Finding Her Place at TNCS

Back in 2020, Ms. Sussman’s childhood friend Jatiya Richardson worked at TNCS and thought TNCS would be a good fit for Ms. Sussman. When she visited the school, she felt right at home and applied for a position. She was hired and immediately made her warm presence felt, despite the many challenges brought by the pandemic. She was the after care teacher who stayed late with the last child when a snowstorm would delay pickup. In fact, in her first 2 years, Ms. Sussman never took a single day off. The administration eventually had to insist she take time away. “I’m always here an hour early,” she explains. “My son has to be at school at 7:30, so I drop him off and come straight to work because it doesn’t make sense to go home at that point.” She sits in her car drinking coffee—unless someone needs something, in which case, she’s ready.

Floating Like a Butterfly

As a “floater,” Ms. Sussman moves throughout the school wherever she’s needed—covering for absent teachers, assisting in classrooms, and providing support to both staff and students. “It’s always good to have a second pair of hands,” she says. “I take floating to the max.” The role suits her need for constant movement and her desire to help everyone. It’s fun to think of her “pollinating” students and staff in this way with warmth, care, and compassion.

When a student is having a rough day, for example, Ms. Sussman steps in with a calming presence. “You have to find out what’s wrong. We all have stuff going on at different times,” she explains. “Sometimes that means taking a child for a walk to help them reboot. Other times, it means giving teachers a bathroom break or a break in general. I know what it’s like to just need a break.”

She’s also mastered the art of helping children sleep during rest time. When teachers return to find their entire class peacefully napping, they ask in amazement, “What did you do?” Her answer is simple: “Nothing. I just sit with them and comfort them.” Ms. Sussman treats each child according to their individual needs, a skill honed from raising her own family. “All my kids—at home and at school—understand I treat you according to what you need, not what you want.” Her secret to maintaining relationships through tough moments? “After you give instruction, whether it’s good or bad, always tell them you love them. That way they come back. That’s why none of them stay mad at me. I’ll be like, ‘You can’t do that. No, we’re not having that. But I love you.'”

Parent Liaison

This school year marks a big transition for Ms. Sussman at TNCS, although not a surprising one. When she naturally began greeting parents and sharing updates about their children’s days before they even asked, TNCS recognized her gift and formalized her role as parent liaison. She understands the anxiety of first-time parents. “You’re dropping your kids off with people they don’t know and who don’t know them. Will they know what to do if the child cries or just doesn’t want to talk?” So she breaks the ice, opening with, “Well, I’m a mom, too.” When she mentions her five children and four grandkids, parents immediately relax. “How did you do it? I don’t know how you do it,” they ask. Her response: “It’s easy. It’s fun.”

In her first month and a half as parent liaison, Ms. Sussman, true to form, took it upon herself to come in early every morning, so she could personally greet each arriving family: “Good morning, how are you? Have a wonderful day.” She understood the morning struggle—she’d been that parent herself. “I used to hate mornings,” she admits. But her cheerful presence transformed other people’s days. One parent told her, “Do you know that just saying good morning changed my whole day?”

On Fridays, she would play celebratory music. “It’s Friday. We made it. Do a dance or something.” She doesn’t even let rain stop her. On one rainy day, a parent asked why she wasn’t using an umbrella. Her response is classic Ms. Sussman: “I don’t need an umbrella because I’m covered with love. The rain doesn’t bother me.”

Beyond greetings, Ms. Sussman actively helps children develop social skills. We all know that kids can “say the darndest things,” but she encourages them to open up, even if what comes out is unexpected. “This is them starting a conversation. They’re not saying anything to hurt anyone.” She helps shy children make friends by facilitating introductions, teaching them how to initiate conversations naturally.

Her efforts ripple outward. Parents who’ve never met her come to the school asking for “Ms. Sussman” based on recommendations from other families. Children she has only minimally interacted with on a given day go home talking about her constantly. “My child talks about you 24/7,” parents tell her.

To the children themselves, she occupies whatever role they need. “You’re like grandma, you’re auntie, you’re mom,” they tell her, “everything all at once.” She tells parents at pickup, “When you leave them here with me, they’re my babies. You come back, you get them, they’re your babies again.”

“Doing it for the Kids”

What drives this relentless dedication? “Somebody has to take care of the kids. Somebody has to be here for the kids, and somebody has to be here for the parents as well.” She tries to instill this philosophy in everyone around her: “Let’s do this for the kids. Let’s look out for the kids.”

Ms. Sussman says she draws inspiration and motivation from her colleagues. “Seeing somebody do good work makes you want to do even more.” She makes sure such dedication doesn’t go unnoticed, believing recognition from the heart matters.

At home, she extends the same care she gives at school. Her house is completely kid-friendly, a safe haven where visiting children never want to leave. When parents bring their kids over, she tells them, “You relax. I’ve got this.” In her spare time, her own children and grandkids pile into her room to watch shows together—they’re “9-1-1 fanatics” in the Sussman household.

Even delivery drivers feel her warmth. She greets UPS workers and food delivery people, offering them water and making them smile. One driver told her, “Every time I come here, you got me smiling.” Her response captures her entire philosophy: “That’s just the way I like to be—happy.”

She has a simple, yet profound message for parents (anyone, in fact): “If you need me, just come find me. I’m always here. We just need people to care about one another more and give back more.”

In LaTriese Sussman, TNCS has someone who embodies that vision every single day—one greeting, one hug, one calmed child at a time.

You may have seen Sarah Steffan around The New Century School campus—she’s everywhere in a day!—or even met with her during an admissions encounter. One thing you may not realize, though, is that Mrs. Steffan, formerly Ms. Weiskopf, was once a lower elementary teacher at TNCS!

It’s been a minute since Immersed sat down with her, and a lot has happened in her life since then. She has gotten married, for one, and is also expecting the couple’s first child, a son, due on Valentine’s Day (<3). This catch-up comes none too soon, as Mrs. Steffan will be on maternity leave once her son is born for the remainder of the school year (but back in time for TNCS summer camp).

Big professional changes have likewise transpired. Mrs. Steffan views herself as an integral part of the admissions team, working closely alongside TNCS Head of School Anne Marie Simonetti, with whom she is very close. “We work together in admissions because I am still learning every day.” You may recall that when Ms. Simonetti joined TNCS in 2021, it was as Admissions Director, and Mrs. Steffan benefits from her mentor’s experience. In fact, she notes that while last year felt mostly like training for the role, this year, she’s truly doing the work. Karen Cintron (IT, among many other roles–look for a future blog about all that Ms. Cintron does for TNCS) and Co-Executive Director Jennifer Lawner have also been instrumental in her successful transition to admissions, and she considers the group a cohesive team.

Path to Admissions

Mrs. Steffan’s journey to her current position has been, in her words, “a winding road.” She taught 2nd and 3rd grade at TNCS for approximately 2 1/2 years, but her teaching career spans a decade in total. After college, she went directly into education, spending 3 years in the Czech Republic working at a Montessori school where she fell in love with the philosophy and completed her training (details are here). That foundation now serves her well in admissions, giving her deep understanding of what the school offers families.

However, by her 10th year of teaching, something shifted. “I think that teaching is not for everyone, and I think it takes strength to admit that,” Mrs. Steffan reflects. Her wife, by contrast, is a first-grade teacher who will likely remain in the classroom until retirement. Mrs. Steffan had believed she would follow the same path, but ultimately recognized that teaching was not her calling. The catalyst for change came at the beginning of the 2023 school year when Mrs. Steffan’s mother passed away. She needed time with her family and knew she couldn’t return to the classroom at half capacity. “You have to be 100% for the children every single day in the classroom, and I just had to admit that I wasn’t able to do that,” she explains. Not wanting to leave TNCS, however, she found a way to stay connected to all facets of the TNCS community: she took over the front desk.

After the “dopamine boosts” she derived there, she realized she prefers a more task-oriented environment: “Teaching is not a task that can be completed; in fact, oftentimes things are left unlearned or untaught.” Admissions, by contrast, offers a full cycle of stepwise “to-dos.” At the end, very gratifyingly, a new student has joined TNCS! Mrs. Steffan did not necessarily set out to join the admissions team; instead, Ms. Simonetti serendipitously asked for her assistance on an admissions-related project, and she instantly found her new passion! She describes it as the ideal stepping stone to admissions by acquainting her with all of the many, many customer facing as well as back-end operations a school requires. “I thought to myself like this would be a really great transition to kind of step out of the front desk role in the sense that I knew I was capable of doing more,” she recalls.

The timing for Mrs. Steffan to fully embrace admissions aligned perfectly when Ms. Simonetti moved into the Head of School role, and she’s confident about the future: “I can see being in admissions long-term.”

Multifaceted Role

While admissions forms the core of Mrs. Steffan’s responsibilities, her role extends far beyond it. She continues to help out with administrative responsibilities and is currently training Zanyah Hawkins, the new part-time front desk person. She also continues to handle some of the incidental billing while gradually transferring those responsibilities to TNCS’s new office admin Amini Nkere.

Event planning and communication also fall under her purview. Mrs. Steffan coordinates important dates with families and assists Ms. Simonetti and Preschool Director Terriann Lane in creating school events. All admission and enrollment management flows through Blackbaud, and she plays a crucial role in onboarding new students—reviewing medical paperwork and ensuring all requirements are met.

Her commitment to relationship-building extends to daily operations. “I like to be around for arrival and dismissal just to continue the relationships that I’ve made with families from enrolling their children,” she says. “I like to maintain those family relationships.” She even considers her morning stop sign duty an important part of staying connected.

Admissions Process

Mrs. Steffan describes how families discover TNCS through various channels: Facebook and other social media, magazine advertisements, the TNCS website, word of mouth, and even local foot traffic. When families reach out, they’re directed to submit an inquiry that enters them into the Blackbaud system, creating profiles for both child and parents.

From there, the school contacts them to schedule either a campus visit or Zoom tour. Following the visit, families submit an application that helps TNCS understand the child and family—their educational background, interests, and other relevant information. The depth of information requested varies by the child’s age, with school records and report cards required for students in 2nd through 8th grade but not for younger children.

The student visit comes next, ranging from 15 minutes to a full day depending on age. The teacher who hosts the visit writes a recommendation that goes to the admissions committee, which reviews the complete application and eligibility for enrollment. Once accepted, families receive a contract, and Mrs. Steffan begins the substantial onboarding work.

Supporting Student Visits

During student visits, Mrs. Steffan makes herself strategically available. She schedules no meetings during these times so teachers can call her to the front desk if needed. “I’d love to greet them again just so they see a familiar face when they come in,” she says. She wants teachers to be able to focus solely on interacting with the child, and direct any admissions questions to her. “It’s really an opportunity for the teacher and the child to interact,” she said. Parents observe only preschool visits; for K through 8th grade, they leave their child at TNCS for the full experience.

Open House Success

For families inquiring between August and the start of school, Mrs. Steffan often suggests attending the open house in addition to or instead of an individual campus tour. The most recent event, held on a beautiful late October Saturday (10/25), drew a good number of attendees.

The day began with teachers escorting arriving families to age-appropriate classrooms where they met lead teachers, learned about curriculum, and let their children explore. Meanwhile, Mrs. Steffan circulated among classrooms, making herself available for admissions questions. Everyone later gathered in the gym for Ms. Simonetti’s presentation on core values, community, curriculum, and exciting school events, which Mrs. Steffan carefully observed to prepare to potentially lead it herself next year. A current TNCS 8th-grader performed a Beethoven piece, followed by refreshments and additional classroom visits.

The event generated significant inquiries, many of which are now converting to applications. “It’s really great to see, yes, you’ve done the first step, which has meant that you met us or met someone here who made a great impression, and now you’ve moved on to do the second step,” Mrs. Steffan says. That new student influx is exciting for everyone in the TNCS community and is what keeps us so vital.

Relationships

For Mrs. Steffan, the heart of admissions lies in family relationships—an aspect she always cherished as a teacher. She still maintains contact with families from her teaching days in the Czech Republic and at Greenspring Montessori school. She finds deep satisfaction in building connections from the first tour or online inquiry through enrollment and beyond. Her exceptional memory serves her well in this regard. If a parent mentions working in IT during a tour, she’ll remember to reach out during Computer Science Education Week. “I really love making the relationship first when I meet them for the tour or the online inquiry,” Mrs. Steffan explains. “I really love getting to know them more at every step and then once the child is enrolled, continuing that relationship.”

She gives current and prospective parents and families an important takeaway: bring us your questions.  “We are a team,” she says. “You can come to any of us about kind of any concern or question, and we’re happy to help and answer.” She acknowledges this message may not be new, but believes it bears repeating—and she really means it.

We can’t wait to welcome Mrs. Steffan—and growing family, including dog Charlie—back to TNCS this summer!