Kinne reflects on three decades in education

Laurie Kinne never imagined herself being a high school principal. 

However, when she was asked to step in at Wichita Falls High School, she jumped right in. And one year later when Memorial was about to open, she knew it was what she was meant to do. 

Kinne’s roots in education date back to her experience with her own schooling. Growing up, Kinne didn’t always enjoy school and wasn’t the best student, especially in high school. 

“To be honest I was a little bit bored in a lot of my classes,” Kinne said. “I used to sit and think ‘there’s got to be a better way to do this, these people are killing me.’ So I would kind of fantasize about if I was the teacher, I would really do this differently.”

That time in Kinne’s life also came with a lot of pressure from having to balance academics and activities, in addition to meeting high expectations from her parents and other adults in her life.

“I always tell students I wouldn’t trade places with them for anything in the world because it’s hard to be a teenager,” Kinne said. “It used to frustrate me because people would say ‘these are the best years of your life,’ and I was like ‘that’s depressing,’ because it’s so hard.”

One thing that helped Kinne through such a tough transitional period was her teachers. 

“I had my English teacher, and I still keep in touch with her today, that’s why I became an English teacher,” Kinne said. “Then I had a coach that really helped me and so the two of them, they really inspired me and I looked up to them. They were my safe place as a kid, and even though I didn’t really like school, I kind of always just wanted to be like them. So I became a teacher.” 

After high school, Kinne attended Grayson Junior College in Denison for two years on a theatre scholarship. 

“Everyone in high school took theatre just because it was so much fun, and I loved it,” Kinne said. “I auditioned for a play my senior year and got the lead and the theatre teacher at the junior college there offered me a full scholarship, and I thought ‘I can get two years of college paid for, so why not?’”

Following those two years she transferred to Texas Tech University where she also received a theatre scholarship. However, she eventually decided to leave the program.

“You have to be able to sing, and you can hear this voice, I cannot sing,” Kinne said. “And so I did go to Tech on a theatre scholarship, but for every play you had to sing a solo to audition, and that’s mortifying because I cannot sing. So I would get up there and belt out ‘Twinkle Twinkle’ or ‘Happy Birthday.’ It was a lot of work, when I wasn’t going to pursue that.” 

Kinne continued to focus on her degree in education at Tech until a car accident brought her home for a semester. She ended up finishing at Texas A&M-Commerce, which was a blessing in disguise because that’s how she met her husband Gary Joe Kinne. 

“It’s really funny because I missed the very first day of class, and so the second day of class I got there and he was like ‘get her in our group,’” Kinne said. “So he told these girls to get me in their group, and anyway he asked me to lunch. They always say ‘when you know, you know’ and I never believed it, but six months later we were married.”

Kinne began her nearly three decades in education at Allen High School where she was the head tennis coach while teaching English and theatre. She later received her master’s in instructional leadership from Texas Woman’s University.  

She and Gary Joe will have their 30th anniversary in January, and they have three children. Their oldest son, G.J. Kinne is the head football coach at Texas State University. Their daughter Kellie is a prosecuting attorney in Arkansas, and their youngest son Landry is also a coach at Texas State with his brother. 

With Gary Joe being a football coach for many years, the Kinnes have lived all over Texas, and even spent some time in California.

In 2022, superintendent Donny Lee asked Kinne to come interview for the director of secondary curriculum for WFISD. The two had previously worked together at Buna ISD, where she was the Buna junior high principal. 

Lee invited Kinne to come to convocation.

“Come see what Wichita Falls is all about,” he told her. 

She came away impressed. She instantly fell in love with the staff, teachers and community. Everyone was so nice and helpful.

Lee recruited Kinne to the position because he was especially impressed with her work ethic and experience. 

“You always look for someone that you can trust to do a good job,” Lee said. “As a superintendent I don’t do all the day-to-day work, I rely on good people to do the work, and so when you’re putting your name and reputation behind people you want to hire people that you can trust to do a good job, and she was one of them.”

Kinne didn’t plan on being a principal, but she decided to pursue the administrative path when she realized the impact she would be able to make from those positions.

“Dr. Lee always says you have to be ‘solution-driven,’” Kinne said. “If you go to him with a problem, you have to come with a solution. So it would frustrate me, but I couldn’t complain about teachers not teaching if I wasn’t willing to do something about it. I always thought our kids deserve to have teachers that love them enough to teach them and hold them accountable. I think when you just put a movie on every day you’re wasting their time. So I had to be willing to do something about it.”

The change has brought about some challenges. As a teacher, Kinne was able to have more fun doing things like dress-up days, and get to know students better through working with them directly. As a principal, however, she often has bigger issues to tackle.

“It’s like being a firefighter, you’re putting out fires all day, and you’re problem solving,” Kinne said. “And so there’s days that I think, ‘Do I want to do this?’ and then I go out and talk to the kids and I’m like ‘OK, I’m good.’” 

One of the most difficult parts of Kinne’s job is figuring out the balance between being tough, while also displaying a relaxed demeanor around the students and staff. Sometimes difficult conversations and decisions need to be made that not everyone will agree with. 

“I’m always going to do what’s best for kids and I think anyone that knows me, they would agree with that,” Kinne said. “But that’s the hard part of being a principal because everyone wants to be liked, but you’re not going to be. So sometimes it’s very lonely.” 

While Kinne has held many jobs over her career, closing Wichita Falls High School as the interim principal and then being the first principal of Memorial High School has been one of the most challenging. She is hoping that next year things will calm down and she can offer more support to students and staff. 

“This year I felt more like an event-planner,” Kinne said. “I felt a little bit like Martha Stewart. I couldn’t concentrate on things that I really need to be concentrating on. 

“I like to look at the data and see where our weaknesses are and let that drive the changes and what we’re going to do next year as far as instruction, attendance, and discipline, all those things. But I haven’t been able to really do that this year because we’ve been planning homecoming and all the traditions, we want to build the culture for Memorial.”

Once she became Wichita Falls High School’s principal, Kinne realized she needed to be with kids and not at the education center all day. Dr. Lee knew she’d feel that way too, which is why she applied for the Memorial job more than a year ago. 

“I get choked up thinking about it to be honest with you,” Kinne said. “It’s just been a real honor to get to be a part of this history, and I’m so blessed. I’m so excited about graduation to see this come to life.”