Canberra Girls Grammar will launch an "international" search for its next principal after Anne Coutts advised the school board she will leave later this year.
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Her husband, Ian Coutts, was recently elected Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Bunbury, in Western Australia.
While Mrs Coutts said she was thrilled by his appointment, she was also very sad to leave the school.
"I've enjoyed every minute of [my time here]. I didn't expect it to be quite so emotional," she said.
Mrs Coutts, a former scientist from the UK, was head-hunted herself for the role more than seven years ago, after three stints as principal in schools across England.
She recalls the move, leaving a house with icilies still clinging to its roof and plunging into the 35 degree heat of a Canberra summer.
"I was doing medical research at Oxford for [a while] but then I very pragmatically decided to train as a science teacher so I'd always get a job while [Ian] and I were travelling around the country. And I just fell in love with it.
"This is my 27th year as a principal but that love has stayed with me the whole time."
While Canberra Girls has been focussing on teaching more STEM, Mrs Coutts admits her first gig as a principal in the UK came in spite of her former life in the lab.
"They said to me afterwards 'look Anne, we would normally have chosen a historian or an English graduate for this...but we decided to make an exception'."
Mrs Coutts has steered the school through "a lot of changes" in the past few years, including its break from former brother school Canberra Grammar.
But she said Canberra Girls was "in good heart" as she finalised arrangements to leave for WA.
In a letter sent to families this week, chair of the school board Belinda Moss praised the work of Mrs Coutts in introducing "innovations" to the school.
"She will be missed," she said.
The board will work closely with Mrs Coutts over the coming months to begin "both a national and international search" for the school's next principal, Ms Moss said. Mrs Coutts will remain at the school for a number of months yet.
Finishing up a post-doctorate degree, she admitted her own career was one of those things "still being worked out".
"I might do something completely different over there, who knows?"
