By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Riverside Elementary School should be renamed to honor its late Principal William Cirullo, a brother of the erstwhile administrator said this week.
Charlie Cirullo on Tuesday added his voice to a movement seeking to have the school district recognize the longtime employee and Princeton native, who died last year. A group of Riverside teachers and others has lobbied school officials to change the school name to “The William D. Cirullo Riverside School.” For his part, Charlie Cirullo said in a phone interview that formulation works for him.
“That would be fine, as long as Billy’s name is on there,” he said.
He recalled how his brother had served his hometown community in and out of the classroom, as a teacher, administrator and lacrosse and football coach, and stayed in touch with his former players. William Cirullo started working for the district in 1970 and climbed the ladder to become Riverside principal in 1986. He died Feb.15, 2016, at 67.
“Up until his passing, each year he would have a reunion with his lacrosse players,” Charlie Cirullo said. “And they would come from different parts of the country. That’s how much respect they had for him. He was a good guy.”
After his death, the “Bill Committee,” made up of teachers and others, was formed, and approached the district about renaming the school — a suggestion that officials are looking at from a broader policy perspective.
“We’re in the process of making sure that we do this in the right way and that we lay out criteria for the naming of a school building and a process for doing it that’s separate from our commitment to Bill and our valuing of his work,” Superintendent of Schools Stephen C. Cochrane said Wednesday.
School board vice president Dafna Kendal said Wednesday that the district would get input from the community, a step that is required by district policy, on what the criteria should be for naming a school after someone. But bestowing such an honor can be tricky.
John Witherspoon Middle School is named after a signer of the Declaration of Independence and past president of Princeton University. But privately, a source close to the district said there have been a handful of people in the community, in the wake of the incident last month in Charlottesville, Virginia, urging the district to drop his name given that Witherspoon was a slaveholder.
Aside from any possible school name change, the district will look to recognize Cirullo in other ways, like creating a common area in front of Riverside to “honor the vibrancy and the values that Bill brought to learning,” Cochrane said.
“We absolutely value Bill’s legacy,” Cochrane said, “and want to honor that and have plans in place already to do that.”
