Debby Mayer is reporting in The Columbia Paper Robert Hess has been appointed interim principal of Germantown Elementary School. Hess, a veteran educator and resident of Valatie, has committed to the district for one year. Hess retired from the Pine Plains school district in 2012, where he served as the principal of the middle school. He is a graduate of SUNY Plattsburgh and began his career in 1975 at Pine Plains. Hess was the first district-hired psychologist in Pine Plains, and helped that district to establish the is first special education classrooms and programs. In 2009, Hess was taken hostage in his office at gunpoint by student Christopher Craft of Stanfordville. The two-hour standoff ended when Craft surrendered to authorities. Since 2011, Hess has presented at hostage/negotiator conferences in the United States and Canada, and has also worked with the Behavioral Science Unit of the FBI in their study of global school hostage events. Read the full story in The Columbia Paper.