President and CEO of Bishop McNamara High School Is Making His Mark In Spite Of A Global Pandemic

By Kia Lisby // PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY ERICA CALHOUN

Completing one of the most challenging academic years in its history, Bishop McNamara High School persevered through 2020 excelling in a host of areas. If there were a grading system for overcoming a global pandemic, Bishop McNamara would have received straight A’s.

According to the Director for Mission Advancement Dr. Robert Van der Waag, this Catholic school rooted in the Holy Cross tradition has had an extraordinary year while facing the challenges associated with the pandemic. Bishop McNamara’s graduating class of 188 students earned over $20 million in scholarships to prestigious colleges and universities across the country including Cornell, Georgetown, USC, Dartmouth, The University of Michigan, Duke, Stanford, and all four national military academies. Bishop McNamara also reached 75% of its capital campaign goal for the La Reine Science & Innovation Center while starting construction on this new facility in March.

Achieving excellence at this level, however, is not new for Bishop McNamara. For the past six decades, excellence has been the school’s standard. What is new, however, is school president Dr. John Barnhardt, who completed his first year in the position on June 1.

As a father, educator, and leader, President and CEO of Bishop McNamara High School Dr. John Barnhardt works to impact the lives of students and those who work within the Bishop McNamara family.

“It’s been a unique year in the history of our school, particularly for Dr. Barnhardt coming in as our new President and CEO. He has done an outstanding job navigating the school through this difficult year due to the pandemic” Van der Waag says of Barnhardt. “Our current success is a testament to him, [former Bishop McNamara President] Dr. Marco Clark, Principal Dian Carter, and the smooth transition effort among them.”

Originally from Wisconsin, Dr. Barnhardt moved to the D.C. Metropolitan area 13 years ago. He attended The University of Wisconsin, Madison and received his masters from American University before recently obtaining his doctorate from The University of Pennsylvania.

Before joining Bishop McNamara in 2020, Barnhardt devoted the last 12 years leading schools with KIPP DC while also starting KIPP DC Northeast Academy in 2013. During his last year, he worked in KIPP’s district office working on school design to better its academic programming and organizational growth.

Wanting a school that valued high-caliber academics, was mission-centered, and committed to diversity and inclusion, Bishop McNamara became the perfect home for this thoughtful educator.

Becoming an educator wasn’t Barnhardt’s first career choice while growing up in Wisconsin. As a youngster, during a career day in middle school, the fire department came brandishing the big truck and equipment and explained what they do.

“For me, that moment, that career day in middle school was inspiring. And it was that one-day experience that really set in for me that I wanted to be a firefighter.”

From middle to high school, Barnhardt did everything possible to become a firefighter including joining the local Fire Explorers Club. He became a volunteer firefighter at 16, and earned his EMT license at 18.

Even though he excelled as an EMT first responder, he decided to pursue higher education. As a result, John became the first person in his family to attend a traditional four-year university.

“I found a college that provided fire training and fire science and during my freshman year in college, I fell in love with the larger idea of going to college and growing in study.”

He then made the decision to transition out of fire science and fire studies and into pre-law while taking several education courses.

Career day inspired Barnhardt to become a firefighter, but he never considered the career path to become an educator beforehand. Realizing he wanted to create experiences for students that “equip them with an experience to have the confidence to make a choice someday,” education became his new passion.

As an educator and leader at Bishop McNamara, Barnhardt’s leadership style is one of “continuous improvement.” He believes in celebrating the greatness of the school but also considers it his responsibility to model continual reflection, refinements, and improvement of character, in addition to job and school performance.

“I also believe strongly in a team and family approach to managing people,” he says. Employing 125 full-time educators and staff, Barnhardt believes that Bishop McNamara is the perfect size for everyone to have a relationship with one another.

When speaking about his experience so far as president, he said “the experience has been terrific.” He can work among the external community and help build partnerships with organizations, thought leaders, and alumni, while providing services for Prince George’s County. In addition, on a day-to-day basis in a “normal year” he can go into Bishop McNamara’s hallways to talk to students, connect with families, and converse about challenging coursework. “That experience is tremendously motivating and where the real joy in education comes from.”

Barnhardt began his Bishop McNamara journey as President and CEO in June 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic was already ravaging the country, which brought significant challenges for this self proclaimed “extravert”.

“One of the great challenges has been coming into a school that was virtual since March 2020. Building relationships with faculty and employees—in addition to students – has been really challenging in the virtual world.” Dealing with the numerous challenges brought forth this year, including the pandemic, has not stopped Bishop McNamara with Dr. Barnhardt as its new President from achieving success and advancing its vision to form empowered leaders.

The principal focus for President Barnhardt remains the building of the La Reine Science & Innovation Center. “The La Reine Science & Innovation Center is so special because we are literally building a science center in the middle of a global health pandemic and I think that speaks volumes about where our commitments and our priorities lie.”

Bishop McNamara will offer in the La Reine Science & Innovation Center STEM classes that will augment its liberal arts curriculum in next generation laboratory spaces, innovation areas for entrepreneurship and cybersecurity, coupled with a multimedia recording studio (Click here to read “An Educational Game Changer” and for a visual overview, click here to see “The Look And Feel.” See “Level Up” Fall 2020 edition of Prince George’s Suite Magazine).

Gaining the experiences through the Center, Barnhardt said “they’ll [students] go into college more equipped to make a decision about career and study.”

In addition to building the La Reine Science & Innovation Center, the curriculum remains another focus area for President Barnhardt, targeting how and what science courses will be taught. He also said, “we need to continue developing our connectivity or support for our immediate community.” Bishop McNamara is looking for partnerships to offer career readiness courses, certificate courses and coding classes, not only for its students, but for their neighbors, at night.

As an educator, having student relationships is what Barnhardt considers most rewarding. “I have never had any interest in looking for a different career path because that connectivity is so important. That love, that relationship building is so important,” he says. For him, students achieving milestones in their lives such as starting families, getting married, attending college, and even coming back to say thank you makes the job worthwhile.