Ari Baum, faculty member who has taught, coached and led at The Hill School for 13 years recently became Associate Head of School 

Baum became Dean of Students in 2016, the Assistant Head for Community Life two years ago, and now the Associate Head of School.  

When Baum first looked for a job many years ago, he stumbled onto Hill’s campus lost and confused. “Nobody wanted me” was how he described the slow months of waiting for callbacks that never happened. Nevertheless, on the night he drove hours from his previous interview to Hill, things were about to change.  

When Baum first arrived on campus, he remembered the campus being completely dark and, without any idea of what was going on, pulled up to the guesthouse to stay there for the night. The next morning, he found himself lost on the way to the academic office but luckily came across a student, Eugene Alvey ’13, who was going the other way. 

“This is just a very Hill thing”, he said, of selflessly going out of your way to help another member.  

Nevertheless, even though the student was going the opposite direction he did not mind how far the journey back to the academic office world be and did not hesitate to walk Mr. Baum to his destination where he completed his interview. This is one of the most special memories he first had at Hill, and one of the biggest reasons of why he finally decided to choose Hill out of all schools.  

This act led him to become a proud member of the Hill community for thirteen years. The first few years he taught economics as a normal faculty member and became dorm head of Wendall. He loves working with different faculty members and teaching different students. The moments that really stood out to him, though, was his first year at Hill because it was the year where he learned the most, and everything was new to him.  

“I quickly realized just how passionate people about Hill,” he said, because there really is “something really special about the school”. It was an especially exciting and interesting year to him as he quickly adapted into his new life in Hill.  

Baum also felt immensely happy and honored to be one of the people who built up the girls ice hocky program. He remembers how the program started with people not even knowing how to skate to now, where students play the sport competitively and has climbed their way up to be able to attend harder competitions. He was proud to announce that he recently got the recognition for his 150th career win, with the plaque hanging on the office wall. 

Unafraid of a challenge, Baum expressed excitement for this new role. His new job works across more areas of the school, and he describes it as a “cross section in all the roles.” His new role not only allows him to continue to work with many of the departments before but also many other new roles. Baum noted that the new position gives him a major “opportunity to see how these areas can work together to service students” and is very excited for what the future brings.