Russ Schmidt, a longtime football coach at Hillsboro and Festus high schools, has been chosen to direct the athletic department at De Soto High School.
The De Soto Board of Education voted unanimously on Feb. 16 to hire Schmidt, 57, of the Festus area as activities director and assistant principal for De Soto High.
Schmidt, who teaches industrial arts at Festus High School and is an assistant football coach at Hillsboro High, will begin his job at De Soto on July 1.
Jon Roop is De Soto High’s current activities director and assistant principal, but he will take over as principal after John Daniels retires at the end of the school year.
Roop is being paid $90,188 this year in his current job and will be paid $110,000 as principal. Daniels is being paid $115,075 as principal this school year.
Schmidt will be paid an $88,000 annual salary as activities director, Superintendent Josh Isaacson said.
Schmidt is being paid $73,565 at Festus this year and $4,432 at Hillsboro, officials from those districts said.
Isaacson said 14 people applied for the activities director job at De Soto. Staff interviewed six of those candidates and chose three finalists, who then met with students and parents, and Schmidt came out on top.
“He rose to the top very early in the process,” Roop said. “He is very passionate about education. I’m elated about the choice, and I can’t wait to work with him. He will do wonderful things for the school and especially for our students. One thing that stood out was he talked about collaborations – he wants the community to be engaged in our athletics and activities, and at the same time, wants our school and students to be engaged in the community.”
Schmidt knows De Soto High well because he has been an assistant on rival Hillsboro High’s football team for 23 years and was the head coach of rival Festus High’s grid team from 2007 to 2019.
He said he’s ready to provide direction for coaches and students at De Soto High.
“One of the questions that came up in the interviews was whether I could make the hard decisions that an AD may need to make,” he said. “I told them that I have been a hard decision (when Festus R-6 administrators asked him to step down from the Tigers’ head coaching position after he learned he would not be recommended to return for a 14th season). I learned a lot about that experience and how I would handle things if I were on the other side of the issue. I think I’m prepared.
“I know I will make mistakes, but I will also own my mistakes, and hopefully help the staff and students at De Soto to be better people.”
While he may be prepared mentally, Schmidt said he has to make some changes to his wardrobe.
“I look at my closet at home, and there are a lot of blue-and-white shirts, and a few black ones. I’m going to have to build up the green part of my closet.”
Schmidt said he will miss his colleagues at Festus and Hillsboro high schools.
“I will leave a family at Festus High. There are a lot of people I love,” he said. “I have another loving family with the Hillsboro football staff. I mentored three people on that staff over the years. Seeing them grow has meant a lot to me.”
Schmidt earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Southwest Baptist University, where he was a member of that school’s first football team.
After graduation, Schmidt owned a landscaping business for 13 years and was a volunteer assistant coach at his alma mater, Hillsboro High.
He then returned to school, earning a master’s degree in administration from William Woods University and an educational specialist degree from Missouri Baptist University.
“At that point, I was bored with the landscaping business,” Schmidt said. “I wanted a challenge. In those days, there wasn’t as much competition in landscaping as there is now. My fellow coaches encouraged me to go into teaching, because I could always find a job somewhere in the state coaching football and teaching shop classes, which I wanted to do. But I look at that point in my life as an example where coaches played a big part in my life, pointing me in the right direction.”
Schmidt and his wife, Stacey, have three children: Hailey, a freshman at Jefferson College; Bryce, a sophomore at Hillsboro High School; and Colton, who attends Hillsboro Junior High.