School Leadership

Welcome, Dr. Molly MacKean!

Kents Hill School is delighted to announce the appointment of Dr. Molly MacKean as Head of School, effective July 1, 2024. She brings more than 20 years of transformational educational leadership at a variety of boarding and day schools across the United States.

Throughout her career, Molly has been driven by her conviction that the work of education needs to keep evolving to serve the hopes and needs of students graduating into a rapidly changing world and by a deep-rooted optimism about the capacity of students and adults to partner together to meet this 21st century challenge.  

Molly was most recently the Head of Upper School at Germantown Academy, overseeing 570 students and 80 faculty within the school’s largest division. As Head of the Upper School, she helped reinvigorate the school’s strategic direction and fostered curricular innovation that includes experiential learning; social-emotional learning; diversity, equity, and inclusion programming; and mind, brain, and education science. She also led the recruitment and hiring process for full-time faculty members and all aspects of the division’s administration, including budgeting, admissions, enrollment, discipline, and faculty review. 

“Molly is an experienced independent school educator with exactly the background, energy, and insight to lead Kents Hill School in our third century,” said Patricia R. Hatler, President of the Board of Trustees and a former Kents Hill parent. “After an exhaustive national search, the Board of Trustees enthusiastically announces her decision to join Kents Hill as our 21st Head of School, the first woman to hold the role since Kents Hill’s founding in 1824. We are eager to begin introducing Dr. MacKean and her partner Jason Oswald to the wonderful Kents Hill community.”

Prior to Germantown Academy, Molly served as the Academic Dean at the Drew School, where she advanced the school’s commitment to experiential learning and robust support for neuro-diverse learners, while at the same time positioning the school as one of the region’s most ambitious and future-oriented institutions across academic, co-curricular, and extra-curricular programming. She has also served as History Faculty and Harkness Instructor at Phillips Exeter Academy, Professor and Teaching Assistant at Northwestern University, History Faculty at Peddie School, and History Faculty at Taft School. Molly holds a Ph.D. in American History, an M.A. in History, and an M.A. in Art History from Northwestern University; as well as an A.B. in the History of Art and Architecture from Harvard University.

“Over the course of her impressive career, Molly has demonstrated an exceptional ability to lead in ways that honor traditional pedagogy while at the same time pushing for innovation and change,” said David A. Greene, Chair of the Search Committee, President of Colby College, and a former Kents Hill parent. “She brings a strategic mindset and a commitment to supporting students from all backgrounds that will propel Kents Hill to further distinction in the years ahead.” 

In partnership with Kents Hill School’s employees, students, families, alumni, and friends, Molly will usher in Kents Hill's historic Bicentennial year and lead the ongoing development of Kents Hill’s Bicentennial Strategic Vision. 

“I could not be more thrilled to be joining the Kents Hill community,” said Molly. “From my first conversations with the Search Committee, I gained a sense that there is a special kind of electricity that runs through Kents Hill: both a love of what the school is, and an energizing sense of optimism about the ways it is growing and evolving as it enters its third century. I was hooked from the start, and my time on campus only reinforced those early impressions. At the core of what makes Kents Hill so special for me is its deep love of place: people clearly care about the school, and that makes them eager to bond together in service to it, to its students, and to its legacy. That is a gift, and an incredibly powerful platform on which to continue to define Kents Hill's place in the world of education.”

Molly is an avid road-tripper and hiker. She, her partner Jason, and their dog Neptune, also enjoy exploring Maine’s beautiful wilderness by canoe, kayak, or paddle board, at any opportunity they find.