School board plays name game

The school board has received four requests for renaming buildings.

By HAROLD GWIN

VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — School buildings here have been named for presidents, former superintendents and community leaders.

People who have made significant contributions to the Youngstown educational system, Youngstown itself or the nation have been honored by the local school board naming district facilities after them.

There may not be enough unnamed schools left to go around to meet all of the renaming requests the city school board has recently received.

Most buildings are named for specific individuals, but North and West elementaries and East High School are basically named for the section of town in which they are located.

The district’s $180 million rebuilding program appears to have prompted the renaming requests as some old buildings are closed and new ones erected.

For example, the board has received a number of proposals to give the new North Elementary School a new name when it opens on Mariner Avenue next fall.

Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr. and William Holmes McGuffey have all been suggested as potential honorees.

On Tuesday, members of the family of the late Emanuel Nicholas “Mel” Catsoules, a former city school superintendent, appeared before the board asking that a school be named for him.

Nicholas Catsoules, his son, pointed out that his father gave 28 years to the school district, 14 of them as superintendent. Catsoules said his family sent the school board a letter about a year ago asking for the honor and decided to renew their request in person after learning that a number of other individuals and groups have been making similar requests.

He didn’t specify a specific building, but naming a school in his father’s honor would establish his legacy, said Catsoules, who was joined at the meeting by his mother, Caroline.

There is no better role model than Emanuel Catsoules for showing children that they can overcome obstacles and succeed, Nicholas Catsoules told the board, pointing out that his father was the son of immigrant parents and couldn’t even speak English when he went to first grade.

Youngstown has a Martin Luther King building, but it is being razed as part of the rebuilding project.

School board member Lock P. Beachum Sr. and the A. Philip Randolph Institute of Youngstown, named for the late black civil rights activist and labor leader, have proposed North be named after King.

It was also Beachum who, 18 months ago, suggested North be named for civil rights activist Rosa Parks.

The William Holmes McGuffey Historical Society and a number of other community organizations have proposed that it be given the McGuffey name in recognition of “America’s Schoolmaster” who grew up here.

McGuffey wrote the famed “Eclectic Readers,” which were a mainstay in American education for decades.

Youngstown did have a couple of schools bearing McGuffey’s name, but the last was razed in 1940.

The Rev. Michael Write, school board president, pointing out that school names are a prerogative of the school board, has appointed a three-member facilities committee to look at the school naming process, and that group will meet today.

Write said all the requests have merit, and one way the board might try to accommodate everyone is to name certain sections of buildings — a library for example — in honor of selected individuals.

gwin@vindy.com