Martin Avenue Elementary School starts a new chapter

For Martin Avenue Elementary School Principal Dr. Mark Wiener, music and teaching have long been his life’s passions. Many at Martin Avenue have seen Wiener blast a few notes on his baritone saxophone with students at jazz ensemble performances, yet they may not realize how important music, especially jazz, is to the beloved principal.

Wiener earned a degree in performing arts from SUNY Old Westbury and pursued a career in music. Eventually he went back to Queens College for his master’s degree in elementary and special education and set a course to fuel his other passion, teaching.

Wiener has been at Martin Avenue, which closed in 1978, since the school reopened in September 2001. In that time, the North Bellmore school has earned a reputation for caring, respect and teacher collaboration. As Wiener, 59, prepares to retire at the end of the school year, he recently reflected on his 11 years at Martin Avenue and nearly 26 years in education.

When then Superintendent James Parla and the Board of Education decided to reopen Martin Avenue, they had to find the right person to step in as its leader. After an extensive interview process, the committee of administrators, teachers and parents selected Wiener. Looking back, Wiener said he felt an immediate sense of belonging at Martin Avenue, even while he was still being interviewed for the job.

“The committee was so humanistic,” he said. He also recalled that the district seemed to want to “balance testing with a good, centered education.”

Wiener, a lifelong Long Beach resident, spent nearly 15 years in the New York City school system, working at a school for children with special needs in Fresh Meadows, Queens. While at School No. 177, he said, he began to learn what it took to be a leader. He was sent to the University of North Carolina’s medical school to learn about a new program to educate severely autistic children.

Upon his return to School No. 177, he instituted the program, Treatment and Education of Autistic and Communication Handicapped Children, or TEACCH, with a class of 24 students. By the time Wiener left the school in the spring of 2001, about 2,000 students were enrolled in the program citywide.