Park City High School Principal Roger Arbabi recently announced his retirement after seven years with the district, but he already has big plans for the future: a journey around the world.
“My wife and I are avid, avid, avid travelers,” Arbabi said. “We’re going to keep Park City as our base, and we’re going to be able to lock our door, walk out and go see the world and come back here when the weather’s good. When the skiing is good and when it’s summertime, we’ll be here.”
Arbabi was born in Texas and predominantly raised in Oklahoma by his Iranian father and American mother. The family relocated to Iran when Arbabi was 7 years old, but they ultimately decided to return to the United States prior to the start of the Iranian revolution in 1979.
He then attended high school and college in Oklahoma, where he earned an undergraduate degree in biology from East Central University. After graduation, Arbabi joined the Peace Corps and served as a natural resources volunteer in Ecuador. His role primarily revolved around agroforestry, a method of land-use management focused on integrating trees into farming systems for environmental and economic benefits.
“I wasn’t quite ready to come back to the U.S. after two years, so I stayed on as a guide in the Amazon, where I took people on tours through the Amazon Rainforest. It was a great gig,” Arbabi said. “But then I was ready to come back to the U.S., and I joined a program called Peace Corps Fellows U.S.A. I spoke Spanish at that point, so I went to El Paso, where they put me in the classroom, and I started teaching science.”
Arbabi said he never planned on becoming an educator. In fact, he chose to major in biology because he wanted to be a physician, but he fell in love with teaching after his first experience in the classroom.
“My wife is a physician, and I saw her during her residency and the hours she was putting in. I said, ‘Forget that. We don’t need two doctors in the family,’” Arbabi said, laughing. “We made a compromise, and I stayed as a teacher.”
He and his wife, Kathryn, met in Albuquerque, New Mexico, but the two moved east to South Carolina for a few years while she attended medical school. Then the couple was off to Texas again, this time for Arbabi to earn his master’s degree in educational leadership and take on his first job as an administrator.
“I was the assistant principal at Granbury High School in Texas, and I was there for several years,” he said. “Then, my wife and I decided to go and live overseas, so I became the high school principal at an international school in Medellín, Colombia, called the Columbus School. We were going to stay for two years, but it was such an amazing experience that we stayed for five.”
But when his daughter was about to start high school, she wanted to have a traditional American experience, so Arbabi and his family packed up and headed to Park City in 2018.
“My wife and I were not responsible parents. Neither one of us had jobs, and we were going to move to a really expensive town,” Arbabi joked. “When I was looking for jobs in the Park City School District, the only job available was a substitute bus driver. I thought, ‘OK, I’ll drive a bus. I’ll get into the system and see what happens.’ As it turned out, through a very unfortunate series of events, the high school principal position became available. I applied for that and got it, and I’ve been here ever since.”
Both of Arbabi’s children attended and graduated from Park City High School, a facility Arbabi described as a great campus with amazing students.
“The kiddos are great. I mean, their frontal lobe isn’t developed and they make bad decisions, but they’re just great kids, and I love just spending time with them,” he said. “I’ve loved working with the teachers too because they truly love what it is that they do. As an educator, your identity is wrapped around your job, and when you come to school every day and you’re making a difference, that’s a positive way to live your life.”
Park City is a unique community for an educator, Arbabi added. The mix of affluent families paired with families working in the service industry creates an interesting dichotomy, and Arbabi believes the high school creates a special environment that allows students from both spheres succeed.
His biggest challenge as principal, though, was navigating the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We stayed open. We closed in March of one year, but we were back in school the following year, but we and my administrative team were doing COVID tests, and we were running clinics, and we were just trying to keep the school safe for everybody. We didn’t know a lot,” he said. “That lasted for a couple of years. Those were tough, tough times, and right as soon as COVID was wrapping up, we started our construction projects on campus. Having to manipulate where teachers are going and maneuver everything, it’s been a challenge.”
Arbabi said he’s happy the next principal will be able to enjoy the new facilities, as well as the positive atmosphere the Park City High School staff brings to work every day.
“I have a lot of respect for my teachers. They’re professionals, and I want to make sure that they do what they need to do. I think we set the North Star as principal. We say, ‘Hey, this is the direction we’re going to go,’ and then we set the tone. You create a culture on your campus that’s positive,” Arbabi said. “Right now, I feel very, very happy with how things are going on campus. The teachers are smiling. The kids are happy to be here. I feel like whoever will be the next principal is going to get an amazing school. They’re going to be able to create and apply their own style and run with it.”
He and his wife have already traveled across the world — from the Galapagos Islands to Antarctica to Oman — but Arbabi said he hopes to explore Southeast Asia in his retirement. He listed Indonesia, Malaysia and Papua New Guinea as a few of his bucket list countries.
In the meantime, however, he’s reflecting on his career and working to wrap up the school year.
“I am so, so, so proud of my time here,” Arbabi said. “I feel like the school is really in great, great shape. I’ve been very fortunate to work with the teachers that I have, and I’ve also had the opportunity to hire some amazing teachers here. I have no regrets whatsoever about my time here in Park City. We’ve gone through really difficult times, but we’ve also come out on top, and it’s been a great experience.”