Lauren Hitron, the president of Notre Dame Academy, an all-girls Catholic school in Park Hills, has resigned after only serving in the role for a single academic year.
Hitron assumed the role in July last year and will conclude her tenure as president on July 27 this year, according to an official statement the school sent to LINK nky.
“NDA’s Board of Directors is committed to ensuring continuity and stability during this time of transition,” statement reads. “The Board has full confidence in NDA’s leadership team to uphold the mission and values of the school and to continue providing an exceptional educational experience for its students. School operations will continue without interruption.”
LINK nky could not immediately reach Hitron for comment but is attempting to establish a connection with her.
Hitron assumed the role in 2025 after the previous President Trish Miller resigned in 2024, amid broader community questions of governance and financial management (LINK nky was not able to corroborate many of these concerns at the time). Like Hitron, Miller only served in her position for a year. The school’s Chief Communications Officer Jane Kleier served as a provisional president in the interim.
“We are grateful to Ms. Hitron for her service and contributions to Notre Dame Academy,” said Mrs. Jessica Rawe, chair of the Notre Dame Academy Board of Directors. “We remain confident in the strength of our community and in our continued commitment to our mission.”
The school is sponsored by the Sisters of Notre Dame, an independent sisterhood of nuns, which operates separately from the local Diocese. A Board of Directors establishes and votes on policy, but the day-to-day operations of the school are split between a president and a principal. Notre Dame’s current principal is Lisa Timmerding, who was also brought on in 2025.
Essentially, the principal handles the internal affairs of the school – student discipline, curricula and pedagogy, as well as some of the spiritual aspects of Catholic education. The president, on the other hand, acts more like the public face of the school, handling fundraising, community and alumni relations, as well as the more business-like activities of the school.
The arrangement is somewhat unusual, even among other NKY Catholic schools, and details of the power structure can vary between institutions that employ it.
“The common pattern in schools using the model, then, is that the president
is the highest authority and the principal is the second-highest authority,” according to a 2000 academic article in the Journal of Catholic Education. “However, in a few schools, rather than one being subordinate to the other, the president and the principal stand side-by-side.”
Compared to public schools, which are subject to open meeting and open records laws, Catholic school governance is opaque, and it’s not clear from the school’s statement how power was split between Hitron and Timmerding. However, the statement does indicate the school may be moving away from the president-principal model.
“As part of NDA’s ongoing strategic planning efforts, the Board is actively evaluating the leadership structure that will best support the future needs of the school,” the statement reads. “This evaluation may include consideration of the current President-Principal model, among other possibilities. The Board will oversee this work in accordance with its governance responsibilities and will remain in communication with the Sisters of Notre Dame USA as the school’s sponsoring body.”
The school’s most recent five-year strategic plan was ratified in May 2025. The webpage about the strategic plan is very broad strokes, and although the president-principal model is mentioned, there’s no definitive indication to the board’s plan. The school declined to share any other strategic planning documents with LINK nky.
Anyone with any information about Hitron’s departure can send tips to news@linknky.com. Anonymous tips are welcome.