Mary K. (Sandefur) Widener
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Mary K. (Sandefur) Widener was born and raised in
Vincennes and now resides in Marietta, Georgia. She graduated from Lincoln
High School in 1965 and from Vincennes University in 1967. She was married
to the Reverend Albert J. Widener, Jr., for 30 years until his death in
1998. During his ministries the Wideners lived in Indianapolis, Lawton,
Oklahoma, and Marietta, Georgia. Widener’s 28-year-old son, Brent, resides
in Thomasville, Georgia.
Widener completed a Bachelor’s degree in education at Cameron University in Oklahoma, a Master’s degree in early childhood development at Georgia State University, and an educational specialist degree in administration at West Georgia University. Her 30-year career as an educator includes teaching in Evansville, Indiana, and Atlanta, Georgia, and in the Cobb County School District in Georgia where she has served as an elementary school principal for 23 years. While Widener served as principal at East Side Elementary School, it was named as a Georgia School of Excellence. She opened a new school, Timber Ridge Elementary, in 1990, and it was recognized as a Georgia Pay for Performance School. Currently Widener is principal at Bryant Primary School, which is part of Cobb County’s first school-within-a-school that she was asked to initiate and develop. |
| The school has been
the site for the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education
tour that demonstrates successful innovations in education. The
Bryant school also was the location for a televised elementary
school drug awareness conference in metro-Atlanta as well as the
site for implementation of a federal grant to teach foreign language
on a daily basis to all kindergarten through 5th-grade students.
Widener’s recognitions include receiving a Kiwanis Club award for excellence in education and being named the superintendent’s designee for the Principals Center International Conference at St. Stephens College, Oxford University, England. She is active in several national and local education associations. A participant in community endeavors, Widener is an elder in the Peachtree Christian Church in Atlanta, and she serves on the steering committee of the Cobb County Wellstar Hospice. She is a board member and past president of the Peachtree Childtown child development center. She is past president of the Rotary Club of East Cobb, having been the club’s first and only woman president in the 20-year history of the club. Widener abides by the motto “Service Above Self” as she fulfills her calling as an advocate for children, especially in public education. |
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