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Gregg Palmer worked in public education for 31 years, from teaching special education students to being superintendent.
And on June 30 he will end that career at the same place he started teaching in 1994, at the Brewer School Department.
Palmer, a Carmel native, was appointed superintendent in 2019 and guided the district through the COVID-19 pandemic and the years that followed. He believes stepping into the role at that time allowed him to adjust to the changes of the pandemic and help students succeed, including by launching an online program that’s still popular today.
Brewer is a school where people already believe in the good of public institutions, which helps because staff, students and families have a lot of personal investment in the schools, Palmer said.
“At the end of the day, there’s a lot of pride in Brewer,” Palmer said.
Palmer came into the education world a bit later than others, starting his first teaching job at 30 years old. He worked at Brewer High School as a special education teacher until 2002. He then moved into administrative work and spent the next 17 years as a principal for three different Maine high schools.
He came back to Brewer in 2019, taking over just a few months before the coronavirus pandemic changed everything.
“I had a little bit of an advantage,” Palmer said. “I didn’t have any idea what I was doing. I’ve never been a superintendent before. That was, in some ways, useful around COVID.”
There’s a community of superintendents who collaborate in the area, which helped, as they all worked together to navigate the changes, Palmer said.
Brewer started its online academy at that time, when everyone hated online learning. It’s now a popular option, and has as many kids enrolled as a Class D school, Palmer said. In Maine, that’s between 100 and 224 students.
“We said to the community, ‘You believe in us, we’re going to try to expand the definition of how your child can be educated,’” Palmer said. “So we tried to repay the faith they had in us.”
For Brewer, its school district’s brand is paying attention to each student and finding the learning pathway that works for them, Palmer said.
“We used to say, ‘We’re going to put you in rows, we’re going to talk at you for 13 years, and then you’re going to have so many skills that you can go out and figure out what you want to do,’” Palmer said. “Earlier and earlier, we’re going to say, ‘What are you interested in? Let’s build around that.’”
There are some parts of being a school superintendent that can be done forever, but other parts start wearing, Palmer said. He decided to let the school calendar decide when it was time to retire.
“We try to keep looking at things anew in fresh ways,” he said of the school district, “but sometimes you just need fresh eyes.”
Dan Chadbourne, the director of pupil services for the Bangor School Department, will take over the superintendent role. He was hired in early 2026 and he and Palmer have worked together in the months since for a slow hand-off.
After June 30, Palmer said he has no set retirement plans, but it will be nice to take walks.
“One step at a time is kind of how the career has gone, so I guess that’s how retirement’s going to go,” Palmer said.
