Longtime school board member Braun retires
When William Braun joined the Washington School Board in 1973, open classrooms, overhead projectors and chalkboards were staples.
“Now, technology has taken over. And it’s for the better,” said Braun.
Over the span of five decades, education has changed, and Braun – a presence on the board for most of that time – has been involved in that evolution.
But Braun, 86, stepped down from the school board in December. He is battling cancer.
“Quite honestly, my illness is the only reason I left the board. I can’t fulfill my duties the way I want to, so it wouldn’t be fair,” said Braun.
Braun was first elected to the school board when plans were underway to build the Washington Park Elementary School at its current location, a move that Braun opposed. He also wasn’t in favor of the open classroom concept the district had adopted.
“I spent the first year being beaten 8-1 consistently,” said Braun, laughing.
Braun’s five children graduated from Washington High School, and he said he wanted to serve on the board to ensure the school district provided a quality education to all students.
Over the years, Braun worked with at least eight superintendents and dozens of school board members, and faced issues including budget deficits, test scores and population decline.
Said Dr. Roberta DiLorenzo, who served as superintendent for 20 years, “It was an honor to work with Bill. Obviously, his years of service are incredible, to serve on a school board for that long, but he was a very active board member, always involved, and always asking questions and wanting the facts. I certainly welcomed Bill’s incredible knowledge of the history of the district. He was a great resource.”
A native of West Virginia, Braun is proud of the school district he served for so long.
“One of our major fights has been proving to the realtors in the area that we’ve got a darn good school district. You always hear people don’t want to move into the Washington School District, but I think we’re as good as any school district around here,” he said.
Braun said one of his happiest moments happened when he attended a national school board meeting in New Orleans and bumped into a vendor who was displaying individual wooden stadium seats that were the same as those in the Wash High’s historic gymnasium.
At the time, the gym was undergoing a renovation, and an architect recommended upholstering the first 10 or 15 rows of the beautiful seats at a cost of about $169,000.
Instead, the vendor traveled to the high school and repaired the chairs for about $50,000, preserving the gym’s historic integrity.
Braun also said he “had the privilege of hiring some really good people,” and is proud of the athletics program and the opportunities it provides for student-athletes.
“Bill has been a central pillar on the board for years. He has been a historian, leader, and mentor who never had a personal agenda or was interested in promoting or ingratiating himself and has always been about what was best for the students in the community,” said longtime business manager Rick Mancini. “His biggest fault is his undying support of the West Virginia Mountaineers.”
Braun served from 1973-1987, 1991-99, and from 2007 until he stepped down.
“People said I was a glutton for punishment, but I did enjoy it, even though sometimes I did get tired,” said Braun. “There were some times when we’d have two or three meetings a month and they’d last three to five hours.”
He also enjoyed the relationships he developed with his fellow board members. There were disagreements, but Braun said he didn’t hold grudges, and once an issue was approved, he wanted to collaborate to make sure it worked for the district.
“He gave a lot of himself to make sure things that should have been addressed were addressed,” said board member John Campbell. “He cared about the school district, he cared about the students, the ones going to college and the ones going into the workforce, and he cared about Wash High football.”
Note: January is School Director Recognition Month