While students interact with their teachers on a daily basis, students rarely acknowledge the work that those in the front office do on their behalf.

Unknown to many students, Diamond Bar High School recently welcomed guidance clerk Shawn Tampio to the staff.    

Tampio, who started less than a month ago, serves as an office assistant to guidance secretary Joanne Taylor, helping process referral tickets granted for tardies and phone use in class. In addition, she also helps process parking permits for seniors.

“I love the staff. Everyone is friendly and kind. The students have been welcoming and cooperative. I’m looking forward to learning names and faces so that I can be friendlier with the students and hope to spend many years here,” Tampio said.

Before working at DBHS, Tampio was a manager at Hostess for 25 years. She then went back to school in the Hacienda La Puente Adult Education program, where she learned more updated computer skills, before working as an office assistant at Walnut Elementary School for three years.

“Working [at DBHS] is nice because I get to interact with an older set of students. The conversations are a little more mature,” she said. “[It] is nice to learn to talk with older students and be interactive with the age group of my school.”

Tampio said that while working at Hostess and working in the education system serve different audiences, they both require similar skill sets.

“At Hostess, you had a customer that came to you wanting to buy a product in retail, whereas here my customer is students,” she said.

“A manager multi-tasks, a manager plans, prioritizes duties, organizes. Those skills are still easily translated in another position, just different in who it is that you’re helping to serve.”

Tampio says that one of the difficult aspects of her position is having the ability to multi-task and be prepared for unexpected change of plans.

“The challenging part is to prioritize your daily duties knowing that things in the school setting come up spontaneously,” she said. “The biggest challenge is to learn to switch gears and go into another project.

Outside of school, Tampio spends time with her two children. She has a 21-year-old son in college and a 7-year-old daughter who currently attends Walnut Elementary School.

“Spending time with my family is my number one priority when I’m off work,” she said. “It keeps us busy to do different things, because [I’m] doing more childish things with my first grader, and more adult things with my 21 year old.”