Photo by Jon Anderson.
Aimee Rainey, assistant superintendent for teaching and learning for Vestavia Hills City Schools, listens as school board members talk about her retirement during a school board meeting on March 31.
Aimee Rainey has been the Vestavia Hills school district’s assistant superintendent since July 2019, but now she has decided it’s time to retire.
Rainey, who has been with the Vestavia Hills school system for seven years and has a total of 26 years in education, will have her last day with the system on July 1.
She began her career as a speech-language pathologist in Washington County Schools in 1999. After four years in that role, she served one year as a high school science teacher, then spent two years as an elementary school assistant principal and four years as an elementary principal in Mobile County Public Schools.
In 2010, she was hired as a middle school principal for Florence City Schools. She served seven years in that role and one year as an elementary principal in Florence before being hired as director of student services in Vestavia Hills City Schools in 2018. She did that job for one year before being promoted to assistant superintendent.
Rainey has a bachelor’s degree in speech and hearing sciences from the University of Southern Mississippi, a master’s degree in educational leadership and administration from the University of South Alabama, an educational specialist degree from Lincoln Memorial University, and a doctorate in educational leadership and administration from Samford University.
Superintendent Todd Freeman said Rainey had been assistant superintendent for only about a year when schools shut down for the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. He gave her the difficult task of coming up with a plan for the school system to continue operating in a matter of weeks.
“A lot of people have a lot of opinions. There are a lot of experts about what we did and didn’t do, but our kids continued to thrive academically, and there’s reasons for that — the leadership in our schools and the direction they were given,” Freeman said.
He also noted that Rainey played a role in the expansion of the school system’s gifted program to the middle schools.
“The fact that all of our middle school students can take some advanced courses beginning in the sixth grade is a big step for our district,” he said.
Rainey did a difficult job well, and she has done it with character and from a caring place, Freeman said.
School board President Scott Brown said it’s bittersweet to see Rainey retire. She has been a consummate behind-the-scenes professional with excellence across the board, he said.
Rainey has been there to make sure Vestavia Hills City Schools’ academic programs meet the standards the community expects, Brown said.
“That’s not always easy. It’s not always one that there’s a spotlight on,” Brown said. “You’ve done it with grace. … Day in and day out with excellence. … We appreciate all you’ve invested into our schools and our students.”
Rainey said it has been a tremendous honor and privilege to serve as assistant superintendent for Vestavia Hills City Schools, but also to be the parent of a graduate of Vestavia Hills High School.
“This has just been the best part of the journey of my career,” she said. “I am invested and will always be invested. As we say, ‘Once a Rebel, always a Rebel.’ I will always be a Rebel.”
