New Principal Brings A World Of Experience To The Butler

Photo: Danielle Betancourt.

Danielle Betancourt, a vice principal at the Brophy Elementary School in Framingham, was named on Monday, June 13, as the next principal of the Butler Elementary School. She will arrive in the district July 1, said Belmont Superintendent John Phelan at Monday’s Town Meeting. 

She replaces Michael McAllister who moves to the Chenery Middle School as its new principal. 

Betancourt, who has lived with her family around the world, including Moscow, Philadelphia, London and in Massachusetts for the past 12 years, will take charge of the district’s most diverse school, with students coming from two dozen countries and speaking more than 35 languages. 

Betancourt matriculated at Fordham University where she was received a Bachelor’s Degree in Russian Studies, a Master’s Degree in Elementary Education from Boston College, and a Master’s of Education in Organizational Management from Endicott College.

Betancourt was named a vice principal at the Brophy in June of last year. Before her appointment in Framingham, she spent an 18-month principal internship at the Horace Mann Elementary School in Newton, where she has been a teacher in a full-inclusion classroom since 2011. 

Prior to the Mann, she served as an elementary teacher in the Boston Public Schools for four years including as a first-grade teacher at the John Winthrop Elementary School in Dorchester.

Additional experiences include co-chairing the PTA at a primary school in England, serving as co-president of the Wharton Kids Club in Philadelphia, and teaching at the Samantha School for English in Russia.