Teacher and Staff Appreciation Spotlight | Mark Murff Facilities Manager

 
Parents' Association Interview with Mark Murff.

Indianapolis-born Mark Murff is the Facilities Manager at The Orchard School. He is responsible for the grounds and the maintenance operations of our wonderful facility.

What drew you to The Orchard School?
The school environment -  honestly I had never heard of the Orchard School before coming here but being in a school environment attracted me. I’ve coached basketball for different age groups for about eight years all around the city and high school basketball for the last three years at Lawrence Central High School.

Can you share a little about yourself and your family with the Orchard community?
I’m a pretty simple person - I’m a task oriented person and I like to have fun. I’m family oriented, my driver is my family. Kimara, my wife of twenty-two years and I have two girls - Keyaira plays basketball at Goshen College - she’s a Freshman and is working on being a Physical Therapist. Our other girl Morgan, is a Freshman at Lawrence Central High School. She’s a musician - she plays the piano and saxophone. She plans on being a microbiologist. My wife also works for Lawrence Township.

What part of your role at The Orchard School do you like the best?
I like all of it. I like moving Orchard forward. That’s what I like the best….keeping up with what the faculty wants to teach the children and creating the environment they want the children to be in. My charter as I see it is to drive the philosophy of Nature as teacher. As soon as you enter the school you should know that that is one of our tenets. As I speak with parents about progressive education - those things still fall under nature as teacher - hands on learning. I want inside the building to reflect that as well as the outside does. I’ve been here for fourteen months and I have a long term plans for the school that I want to see through. I’ll stay as long as they’ll have me!

How would you describe the Orchard School and your group’s role?
A place where faculty are allowed to be creative...to find ways of teaching children. My group - we are the support function. We support the school.

Who are the members of the Facilities group?
Alex Tonnis - Inside Maintenance; Abby Thompson and Tony Harrington - Grounds and right now we have an open position for Inside Maintenance. I have a lot of fun building camaraderie with the group. It’s not really a direct science - relationship building is about a team working together. Working together and advocating for those relationships.

What are three things that would surprise the Orchard community about you?
That’s a hard question. I’ll have to think about that one. My kids go to the same school I graduated from  - Lawrence Central High School. I like to travel. Even in my travels I have done Facilities Management - in Costa Rica, New Jersey, California and here in Indianapolis. I’ve had the opportunity to work in Facilities Management in many different areas. I like what I do.
I’m a grill master! Whatever you put on the grill I make it taste good - I’m just good at what I do!

What advice would you give to the Orchard community?
Participate! Throughout my years of being in schools, I have found that the more participation a school has, the more successful the school. Participation here at Orchard is really good but it can always be better. One of the challenges of my job is that there are always things to participate in here at Orchard and that’s a good thing!
 
Letter Boxes are located in the Center; next to the Elementary School Art Room; in the Early Childhood hallway; and near the Middle School Administrative Office. Now you can drop off your letters of appreciation to all of your favorite SUPERHEROES disguised as teachers, administration, maintenance, cafeteria staff, and Kids Connect staff. Letters will be delivered during Teacher and Staff Appreciation Week, March 12-16.
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