location

Union Hills

Zennis Lee
Principal

Zennis is a fortunate man of circumstance. His parents come from the most densely populated city on the other side of the world, Hong Kong. Before he was born, Zennis’ parents decided to immigrate to the United States because in 1997, the city of Hong Kong was being returned to China from 156 years of rule by the British. As fate would have it, Zennis would begin his life in the south side of Chicago. Fortunately, his parents had enough foresight to move to the northern suburbs of Chicago for a more consistent education. School seemed to breeze by before he realized that he was no longer a child.

Zennis was the first of his family to attend college. His alma mater is the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. With a biology degree in hand, Zennis moved back home for the better part of a year before moving to Phoenix, AZ. His first occupation in Arizona was a polysomnographic technologist; a position that runs sleep studies on patients that may have sleeping disorders. After realizing that the medical industry was not for him, he worked a few odd jobs until he tried to sell a used minivan to a reading specialist from Avondale. The teacher never purchased the vehicle, however, she sold him on the idea of becoming an educator. The first year was rough. Having no formal training in education (aside from attending school himself), he survived his first year. Even though the year was rough, the fulfillment that he received from the position was more than enough to convince him to go back to school full time (for a master’s degree in education) while working as an emergency certified teacher in middle school. 4 years later would see him move up to the secondary education level with e-Institute. He has been with e-Institute for 9 years, which would see his promotion from a teacher to an assistant principal, and finally to a site principal.