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GIBSONVILLE — Eastern Guilford High School began the school year fresh.

Not only do the students and staff have a new building, but leadership has changed hands, too.

Greggory Slate, the new principal, said his No. 1 focus is improving academic performance at Eastern.

“We have the capability to be one of the top schools in the region, if not the top school in the district,” he said.

The school was one of 10 schools in the county named “low-performing” this year. Eastern didn’t meet expected academic growth goals on the ABCs, the tests the state uses to measure academic growth.

“We’re going to rise up and remove that label real quick,” Slate said.

His first step is extending the lunch period to a full hour. Half of that time will be for eating and socializing. During the rest of the time, struggling students will attend tutorials.

Students who are earning A’s, B’s or C’s can use the time to attend club meetings, play intramural sports, do SAT preparation, study, meet with guidance counselors or do other activities.

“We’re going to see a lot of success,” Slate said. “Students are excited about it; teachers are excited about it. So, I’m hoping we can keep this momentum.”

Because clubs will meet during the day, the school will host few after-school meetings. This will allow students with transportation difficulties to participate and will encourage more students to be involved in extracurricular activities.

“This is a new idea for Guilford County,” said Slate, who got the idea from a Raleigh school.

The “Wildcat Lunch” also builds time for teachers to work on “professional learning communities,” in which teachers leading the same course make sure all students are learning the same material.

Slate said he wants to make courses more rigorous and students to boost SAT scores. Also, he wants eventually to increase the number of Advanced Placement courses offered and the number of students taking those courses.

Also this year, Freshmen Academy began at Eastern. That restructuring, which was already in progress before Slate arrived, keeps freshmen in one part of the building with their own classes and lunch times. Students are grouped into teams, as in many middle schools. Freshmen will have “Wildcat Lunch,” too, and their teachers will meet to do cross-curriculum planning so students connect ideas throughout different subjects. For example, if students are learning about WWI in social studies, their math teachers could pose word problems asking students to calculate the rate of soldier fatalities in trench warfare.

Slate said he spends as much time as possible in the hallways and classrooms and wants parents to know he has an open-door policy. He said he is an active listener and tries to be transparent about the reasons behind his decisions.

He said he’s happy to be at Eastern.

“It’s definitely a community school,” Slate said. “The community’s behind it. The folks who went to school here are still very loyal to the school.”

Alumni and neighbors want the school to succeed, and “when I reach out to the community I get some good, strong support,” he said.

Slate, who grew up in Trinity, received a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Tulane University. He received a bachelor’s degree in history and a master’s degree in educational leadership at High Point University.

He taught at Lexington Senior High School for seven years before going into administration. His most recent job was assistant principal at Grimsley High School. He also has served as an assistant principal at Dudley High, curriculum facilitator at Northwest High and Intervention Team Specialist at Central High School in High Point.

Slate likes to spend his spare time hanging out with his wife and toddler son. He also referees soccer games through the collegiate level, although he limits the number of games.

“I try not to take a lot of time away from my family or my school,” he said.

Contact Jamie Kennedy Jones at jamie.kennedy@news-record.com or 449-4610.