Simon Chiu, former Vice President of Financial Development at the YMCA of Silicon Valley, took a new step in his career at the end of June. Chiu became the new Director of Development at Archbishop Riordan High School.

Chiu attended St. Peter’s School and grew up in San Francisco’s Mission District. He went on to Saint Ignatius High School and enrolled in Santa Clara University where he was an English major.

After receiving his teaching credential at UC Berkeley, he started his teaching career as an English teacher at Saint Ignatius where he worked with Principal Tim Reardon in the English Department.

He went into the business world, but decided he wanted to work in education. His first administrative job was at Monroe Catholic High School in Hayward where he was an assistant principal for five years. Next, he worked as a principal at Saint Joseph Notre Dame for eight years in Alameda, where he currently lives.

He then was president at Saint Francis High School in Mountain View for a few years. After doing fundraising work at the YMCA of Silicon Valley, he received a phone call from President Dr. Andrew Currier during the spring time and decided to apply for the position of director of development.

Chiu said, “I knew there was good stuff happening in the school [Archbishop Riordan High School]. I knew that the school had just renovated the gym, redid the field, and announced that they were going co-ed. It seemed like there were a lot of cool and exciting things happening in the school. So, it seemed like a really interesting opportunity and I decided to apply and here I am.”

In the springtime, Riordan High School was searching for a new director of development as John Ring had announced that he was leaving. Chiu had some connections with other administrators at Riordan, including Currier and Reardon. He had only talked with Currier over the phone a few times, but he knew Reardon from their days as teachers in the English department at Saint Ignatius.

Chiu has multiple ideas in mind for the goals he wants to accomplish at Riordan. As many of Riordan’s athletic facilities have already been renovated, Chiu is hoping to focus on other aspects of the school that need to be worked on.

Chiu stated, “My major goal, really, is to focus on remodeling and modernizing all the academic spaces. So that would mean the main school building, the classrooms, things like that.”

Through Chiu’s enthusiasm and knowledge, many hope Riordan will continue to elevate the school’s profile and quality of experience. Currier is looking forward to the great ideas that Chiu will bring to the Riordan community.

Currier said, “I believe Mr. Chiu is going to assist the school in renovating the building, adding much needed sources of money for scholarships and tuition assistance, and looking for areas where we can improve our development efforts in terms of alumni relations, community relations, and telling the Riordan story far and wide.”

Chiu has many ideas and projects for the development of Riordan, and hopes to gain even more experience by making valuable connections.

Chiu stated, “I’m looking forward to getting to know all of our great faculty and staff. I know we’ve got a lot of awesome teachers and we’ve got a lot of new teachers this year. I’ve been able to meet a few of them on the various zoom meetings that we’ve had, but I’m just looking forward to meeting all these great people.”