Stonington - Deans Mill School Principal Kelly Spooner said Monday that she will leave her position July 31 to take a job as principal of the K.H. Ryerson Elementary School in Madison.

Last week a team of Madison school officials toured Deans Mill and talked to staff members before the Madison school board selected Spooner for the job.

"Stonington is an exceptional school district. It has a rigorous program and high standards and I leave feeling blessed to have begun my administrative career here," she said. "I'll miss the staff and the students. This is a great learning community."

But Spooner said her new job is closer to her home in Haddam. In addition, the Stonington Board of Education's decision earlier this year to eliminate an administrative position put Spooner on notice that she likely would have been laid off at the end of the current school year. She had been at the school for the past three years. Anne Hogsten, the assistant principal at Deans Mill has also announced she is leaving to take a principal's job in Plainfield.

This means that next year the school and its 526 students will have a new principal but no assistant principal.

Spooner will now head a school that has 300 students in grades 1 through 4.