WILLARD PTA - Key Persons
Addie Holsing, a beloved educator and longtime English teacher taught for 40 years, nearly 30 of them at Willard. From her arrival as a new teacher in 1969 until her retirement in 1997, Addie Holsing played a vital role in the life of the school. She revived Willard's Spring Day after it had lapsed in the 1980s, re-establishing a tradition that continues to this day. She was known for her innovative approach in the classroom, and for her kindness and generosity to students and colleagues. "She changed my life by letting my class have a daily newspaper," remembers writer Holly Goldberg Sloan, who attended Willard in 1971. "I will remember that class and Addie until my last breath." Holsing was widely respected for her research on teaching and learning, particularly her work toward equality of access to learning. In the early 1990s she worked closely with principal Chris Lim and Ann Hiyakumoto to replace the "tracking system" at Willard with an approach that better supported students and teachers. She "taught writing and comprehension using brain-based strategies and multiple intelligences before the terms had ever been invented," writes Heather Wolpert-Gawron, an award-winning California middle-school teacher who remembers Holsing as her first mentor. "[She] took me under her wing when the frustrations of teaching in an inner city school were almost too great for a newer teacher to bear without a veteran's direction."
After retiring from teaching, Holsing continued to work as a consultant, teacher mentor, and sought-after lecturer. Her many accomplishments included developing the ACORE curriculum guide and establishing Building Bridges, a summer institute to support at-risk students. "Only an extraordinary person can impact so many lives the way she did, as teacher, friend, mother, confidante," wrote her friend Margarita Navarrete in a Facebook post.
Job Titles:
- Willard Student Body President in 1969
Few musicians in jazz history have been more vigorously productive and resourceful than tenor sax player David Murray. He has released more than 150 albums over the course of four decades, at times putting out up to a dozen albums per year. His use of the circular breathing technique enables him to play astonishingly long phrases, and he remains a tireless innovator. Born in Oakland, he grew up in Berkeley and studied music from an early age with his mother, organist Catherine Murray, as well as Bobby Bradford, Arthur Blythe, Stanley Crouch and others. After graduating from Berkeley schools he went to Pomona College but dropped out in 1975, moving to New York, where he roomed with Crouch and was at the heart of the underground "loft jazz" scene. He led numerous bands at jazz clubs around the city (including a big band at the Knitting Factory), and was a founding member of the World Saxophone Quartet. In the 1990s, Murray relocated to Europe and now splits his time between Paris and Portugal. His latest album is Perfection, with pianist Geri Allen and percussionist Terri Lyne Carrington.
Murray's mother died in 1968 when he was just 13, and in 1969 he was Willard's student body president. At a time that must have been turbulent both politically and personally for Murray, he showed his cool in a short essay written for the school yearbook about the desegregation movement: "We could all get along with integration if everyone would be cool and naturally do their own thing."
Debra Pryor has quietly but firmly forged a career of firsts. She was only the second black woman in the nation to become a fire chief. In Berkeley, she was the first female firefighter, paramedic and paramedic supervisor, and the first woman to hold the titles of lieutenant, captain, assistant chief, deputy chief and fire chief. Pryor credited her family and her Berkeley upbringing with giving her the determination to blaze her own trail. When she was just a kindergartner, Pryor's mother, a BUSD employee, signed her up for the city's new school integration program. "I was one of three African-American kids in my class," Pryor said in a 2012 interview. "That didn't mean anything to me at the time. But it was the kind of experience that prepared me to be successful and to be OK with being different from others. I had countless experiences later in life where I was the only woman and the only African-American, and I had the courage and the confidence to lead, speak up and to have an opinion that was different than others." At Willard, she remembered being impressed by the supportive and caring teachers she had. "They were very selfless; they really gave of themselves," she recalls. "I think that had a lot to do with why I chose to get into public service myself."
Writer Gary Kamiya attended Willard from 1965 to 1967, when, he says, "It felt like a nice introduction to the wider world and to society. . . Willard was a microcosm of Berkeley at that time." Among his memorable Willard teachers were a "really tough" science teacher named Mr. Williams and the "charismatic, inspiring" history teacher Mrs. Ploss, whose class he credits with awakening an early interest in history and storytelling. Kamiya went on to have an eclectic career which included driving a taxi in San Francisco for 7 years while completing college and working as a freelance writer. He started a shortlived city magazine called Frisko and worked for five years at the San Francisco Examiner before co-founding the groundbreaking web site Salon.com in 1995. In 2013 he became the executive editor of San Francisco Magazine. His book Cool Gray City of Love is an acclaimed exploration of his home city of San Francisco. He also writes the San Francisco Chronicle column "Portals to the Past," which features unusual and little-known stories from San Francisco history.
Holly Goldberg was born in Michigan in 1958 and spent a peripatetic childhood traveling the world with her family. Her youth was spent in places as diverse as California, the Netherlands, Turkey, Yugoslavia, Washington D.C. and Oregon. After graduating from Wellesley College she moved to Los Angeles, selling her first screenplay at the age of 24. For the next ten years she worked in commercial advertising as a production assistant, then a script supervisor, a producer, and finally as a commercial director. She wrote numerous family films, including the Walt Disney feature "Angels in the Outfield," and the Universal Pictures comedy "Made in America." She both wrote and directed the "The Big Green" and the children's film "Heidi 4 Paws."
In 2011 Sloan published her debut young adult novel, I'll Be There, which won numerous awards. Her second novel, Counting by 7s, also won wide acclaim and is read in classrooms around the globe. She's since written two more children's books, Just Call My Name and Appleblossom the Possum. Fittingly for someone who spent her childhood traveling the world, Sloan's books are currently in print from thirty-two publishers in twenty-three languages.
Sloan spent her seventh grade year at Willard, where she was unforgettably impressed by English teacher Addie Holsing. "She changed my life by letting my class have a daily newspaper," Sloan recounts on her website. "I will remember that class and Addie until my last breath."
Job Titles:
- LEARNS After School Program Specialist
Fans of Patricia Polacco's children's books may be surprised to know that the award-winning author and illustrator didn't learn to read until she was 14 years old. And that life-changing event came about at Willard Junior High, thanks to the efforts of a caring English teacher, George Felker.
Polacco's adolescence was "grim," in her words. Although she was artistically gifted, she suffered from dyslexia and other learning disabilities, most of them unrecognized in the 1950s. She was teased for her differences and at Willard a bully singled her out for special torment. Polacco never told anyone about the bullying, but one day Mr. Felker witnessed it and intervened. The boy was expelled. Felker then asked Polacco to help in the classroom after school, where he surreptitiously tested her skills by asking her to write letters and numbers with a sponge while she was cleaning blackboards. He recognized that she needed help, and found Polacco a reading specialist who started her on the path to literacy. "The man was a visionary," said Polacco. Eventually Polacco would become a successful author and illustrator, writing scores of illustrated storybooks. In 1998 she wrote Thank You, Mr. Falker, telling the story of the Willard teacher who changed her life. Polacco couldn't find her former teacher at the time to ask permission to use his real name, so she changed it to "Falker" and dedicated the book: "To George Felker, the real Mr. Falker. You will forever be my hero." Through her books and art, Polacco has consistently conveyed a message of encouragement for anyone who's ever felt "different" or unloved. Her illustrated children's books have garnered numerous awards over the years, including three Parents' Choice awards and the Sydney Taylor Book Award for Jewish children's literature.
Phil Chenier attended Willard in the 1960s and played basketball at Berkeley High and UC Berkeley. In 1971 he was drafted to the NBA Baltimore Bullets where he played professionally until 1979. He also played for the Indiana Pacers and the Golden State Warriors. Known for an extraordinary jump shot, he averaged 17.2 points per game for his career, and was named to three NBA All-Star teams. According to former teammate Kevin Grevey, Chenier was "the best pure two-guard that has ever played in this organization. . . Phil had special gifts that no one else in the league had at that time."
After retiring from professional basketball in 1981, Chenier moved into sports broadcasting. Since 1987, he's been the voice most consistently associated with the NBA's Washington Wizards, working as Comcast SportsNet analyst alongside play-by-play commentator Steve Buckhantz. Observes former Bullets player Kevin Grevey, "That ease and that grace that he had a player, I see it transcend into the way he broadcasts. He's not choppy. He's not real up and down. He's not real boisterous on a call. That beautifully succinct ease that he has on the air kind of reflects the way he played."
Job Titles:
- Special Education Case Manager