New principal at South High School: Ahmed Aden Amin

Ahmed Aden Amin  is the new principal at South High School. In 2021, he was hired as the principal at Sanford Middle School, where he attended school himself. He graduated from Roosevelt High School, and went on to earn a bachelor of arts in sociology and a masters in education from the University of Minnesota.A teacher helped him register for the ACT. Amin reflected, “I knew then that if I was going to succeed, it was because someone believed in me.” He returned to Roosevelt as a social studies teacher and debate coach before getting his principal’s license. 

 

Amin has never forgotten the years he spent as a refugee with his parents and five siblings after the Somali Civil War broke out in 1991 when he was five years old.  " My siblings and I never attended school because we were always on the move. The first time I set foot in a school building was when I walked into Sanford as a sixth grader," said Amin. "I didn’t know any English, but Sanford would become my mecca – my safe haven.” 

 

As principal at Sanford, he worked to create a trauma-informed environment where kids understand adults care.