Sperber Award

In 1998, an award was inaugurated in honor of Dr. Robert "Bob" Sperber, to be given to an administrator in the Brookline Public Schools who best exemplifies his ideals. Dr. Sperber was Superintendent of Schools in Brookline from 1964 to 1982.

Thank you sooooo much.  Thank you soooo much.  Dr. Sperber, Skye Kramer, Kathleen Sheehy-Chan, and all the caring and generous people who are the Brookline Education Foundation, thank you!  And thank you to all my family and friends who came here today I love you!

This is like a funeral, only better.  I'm not dead yet!

So I figured you would say complimentary things about me because, after all, you gave me an award!  And I didn't want to be overly modest or disingenuous.  So I went online and googled, “accepting an award with grace, but not with a preponderance of humility.” This quotation appeared (most people think Nelson Mandela said this in his Inaugural Address but, actually, a woman named Marianne Williamson wrote this):  “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.  It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.  We ask ourselves, “Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?'  Your playing small does not serve the world.  There is nothing enlightened about shrinking, so that other people won't feel insecure around you.   We are all meant to shine, as children do!  It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.  And, as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.”

So, to honor the true brilliance, the Brobdingnagian talent, the great humor,and the colossal work ethic of the faculty, staff, students, and parents of Brookline High, I accept this award, as one of you.

So how did this happen to me?  How did I get to this special moment? Teachers, mentors, and heroes!  Teachers, mentors, and heroes matter!  Beginning with my parents, my first teachers!

My dad a smart (he would read books deep into the night), peaceful, generous (even though he had very little money, he would buy hot dogs for all the players on our little league baseball team he managed), and unconditionally loving man, who was a cheerleader for me he introduced me to my first teachers and heroes Adlai Stevenson, New York Times columnists Scotty Reston and Russell Baker, and President John Kennedy.  He also took me to Ebbets Field, in Brooklyn, where we watched number 42 Jackie Robinson, #4 Duke Snider, #39 Roy Campanella, #45 Johnny Podres, #14 Gil Hodges, and #32 Sandy Koufax (it's amazing how I can remember all of these numbers from 50 years ago and I can't remember what I did this morning!)  And there was no subtle communication from my dad to me that Buzzy Bavasi, the Dodgers' General Manager, was a courageous and heroic man because he brought Jackie Robinson to the Majors.

Above my desk at home is a picture of my dad, shaking hands with Vice-President Hubert Humphrey.  My dad worked for the United States Department of Labor; he believed deeply in public service, and that government had an essential and fundamental role to make people's lives better, and particularly those of us economically and socially at risk.  I guess he had an influence on us; my brother Rich spent his work life as head of Homeless Services for the City of Boston, and my sister Ellen, currently a Commissioner on the Federal Election Commission, has been a public sector attorney for most of her life.  It's a genetic public service thing our daughter Sarah served in the Peace Corps in Ecuador for three years and is a now a nurse at Children's Hospital; and our son Dave is an English teacher at Newton South High School.  It even rubbed off on Judy who manages the Boston Social Security office.

And my mom When I was in high school and in the summer before I went off to college, I worked as an elevator operator and doorman at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in Manhattan.  We lived in Queens; I worked the 4 – midnight shift, and I often worked Overtime.  I had to take two subways and a bus, the Q16, to get home.  Here's the first stanza of a  poem I wrote for my mom on her 80th birthday.  It is called, “2 am at the Flushing IRT station”

I climb the concrete steps
That lead from the subway
To Main Street.
I emerge from the station,
Glance up the dark street,
And I smile;
There she is
In the gray Buick Lesabre
It is 2 am at the Flushing IRT station;
Mom is there,
Alone,
To drive me home,
And save me from a sleepy ride on the Q16 bus.

That's about the practice of love!

Teachers, mentors, and heroes matter!

Mrs. Ferris, my second grade teacher, in PS 30 I loved her, and she loved me back. Mrs. Aranow, my fourth grade teacher, in PS 209 she made us fold the yellow math paper into 16 squares, and then she fired the times tables at us I know that 9 x 7 is 63! (I had two not good teachers in grades 5 and 6; that must be why I didn't get into Tufts!) Sylvia Cole, my 11th grade English teacher she convinced me that I was somebody, andI could write that was a big epiphany for me.

Teachers, mentors, and heroes matter!

Colin Wilson this weird British guy, with a wool Scollay cap, peered into and skulked into my college philosophy classroom, and then lectured us on how literature, philosophy, and life reflect a sad banality and dramatic under-use of our potential for happiness he described the St. Neot experience – ask me about it later – and it changed my life.  His book, Poetry and Mysticism, still resides on the night table next to my bed.

Bob Dylan a poet from Hibbing, Minnesota, who took up residence in Greenwich Village, New York City here's Bob's voice, from “Masters of War”

Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul.

And, from  “Only a Pawn in Their Game”

A South politician preaches to the poor white man,
“You got more than the Blacks, don't complain.
You're better than them, you been born with white skin,' they explain.
And the Negro's name
Is used it is plain
For the politician's gain
As he rises to fame
And the poor white remains
On the caboose of the train
But it ain't him to blame
He's only a pawn in their game.

Teachers, Mentors, and Heroes Matter!

Poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

English Professor James Frakes.

Norman Mailer prolific and most talented writer, lousy boxer, and noisy public character He and Jimmy Breslin ran for Mayor and City Council President of New York City promising, “We will go to Queens!” Hey, I'm from Queens!

Martin Luther King, Jr. he really defined diversity it's not about the color of your skin; it's about the content of your character!

Teachers, Mentors, and Heroes Matter!

Psychiatrist Robert Coles, who knows that children matter!

Professor Michael Sandel who knows that justice matters!

Larry Bird, Robert Parish, Kevin McHale, Dennis Johnson, and Danny Ainge, who know that hard work and teamwork matter! Theo Epstein and Terry Francona, who also know that!

George Viglirolo, Margaret Metzger, Debbie Quitt, James Cradle, Gretchen Underwood, Mike Frantz, Elaine Lombardi, Jim Smith, Steve Barrasso, Nancy Guttman, Nancy Howard, Osna Sens, Charlie Webb, Liz Kean, and so many more, who know a lot, and know how to work well with the kids.

Jim Walsh, who would sit me down, ask me to write out what new items or projects I had on my agenda After thinking for a few seconds, I wrote down three new ideas.  Jim would remind me about the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth ideas and he would tell me to cross off six of the nine!  He would also call me, or stop by, every afternoon at 5:30 or so, and ask how I was doing, and if there was anything he could do for me.

Teachers, Mentors, and Heroes Matter!

Blintzes and latkes,
Movies and Motown,
Jasper Johns and Treasury Bonds
Cape Cod Bay and Cane Garden Bay
Sarah and Dave, Edwin and Jessie,
Judy Bernstein matters!

So, after all these years, and all these experiences, and all my teachers, mentors, and heroes, what have I learned?  I keep a folder at home entitled, “Wisdom and Humor.” It's fat.  What have I learned?

First of all, I grew up in a neighborhood where a number of my friend's parents had blue numbers branded onto their forearms reminders of the concentration camps I went to a college whose fraternities and culture sanctioned racism and anti-Semitism I lived in Birmingham, Alabama, saw the white and colored signs on public facilities; my house was broken into, and my books were burned on my lawn, by Klansmen.  I have always felt personally vulnerable, and some sensitivity to the collective vulnerability of people who are defined by others, and made unsafe by others.

Perhaps my most profound understanding and commitment is that we are one big complex family; we are so much more alike, with similar needs and aspirations, than we are different and every person must experience respect and dignity people must be able to define themselves, and then feel safe living in this world as that person Dr. King's moral imperative, that we judge people on the content of their character is fundamental to that commitment.  We have so much work to do to rise above ignorance, prejudice and tribalism.  It is our most important work.  And we have to continue that work in our homes, and in our schools.

I began teaching in a tough working class community in New Jersey.  Upon showing up for the first day of school, my principal said to me, “Bob, you are in Room 202; your books are there; see you in June.”  My first act as a teacher was to write, “Bob Weintraub” on the blackboard, sit on my desk, and wait for the first class.  My first two students – George and Patrick -- walked into the classroom, saw me, saw my name on the board, came up to me and put their arms around me, saying, with some sarcastic enthusiasm, “Bob, how ya doin'?” (emphasis on the “Bob”)  When the other students entered the room, George and Patrick introduced me, “This is Bob, guys!” Students said, “Hey, we got Bobby as our teacher yeah!”  My first move as a teacher; my first major mistake.  (Mind you, this was no SWS!)  That class tortured me throughout the year.  I was smart enough to figure out that Bob Weintraub had to become Mr. Weintraub, as weird as that felt.  The next class, under the leadership of Mr. Weintraub, was better, not good.

The lesson:  adults need to be adults for our students!  At Brookline High, that has emerged as one of our mantras, “A Unified Adult Voice in Support of our Kids.”  Being adults with our kids matters!

In 1910, Brookline Superintendent of Schools George Aldrich said, “High school pupils are in their later teens they are in the effervescent or yeasty period of their lives a time full of great possibilities for good, but full, also, of perils.”  the yeasty period of their  lives a time of agitation and ferment true in 1910; still true in 2008!  Holden Caulfield said it in another way ”The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything.  If they fall off, they fall off, but it's bad if you say anything to them.”

I love that Superintendent Aldrich acknowledged, in 1910, that the essence of teenage existence is agitation and ferment it's timeless their agitation and ferment is often expressed as they push up against the adults in their lives, and the values that the adults hold and demonstrate Teenagers are yeasty and, in our work with them, we have to accept this about them, embrace their human imperfection, and like good parents, be responsible adults we have to hold them accountable for their behavior while maintaining our strong relationships with them, and continuing to offer them our unconditional positive regard, our love! when they think it is a prank to slam doors around the school, we have to identify them, punish them, get them into a contrite condition, and get them back on track as responsible citizens of their school community when they fight, or write graffiti on our walls, or set off a false fire alarm, all of which are rare around here, we have to be firm, punish them, get them into a contrite condition, and get them back here as responsible citizens of their school community when they slack off, we have to restructure their lives so they can be more productive, more successful.  Thomas Edison said, “If I were a school teacher, I would put lazy pupils to study bees and ants.  They would soon learn to be diligent.”  We haven't done that yet but, schools should be about high academic and social/civic standards, and redemption!  Redemption matters!

Edison also said, “As a cure for worrying, work is far better than whiskey.  I always found that, if I began to worry, the best thing I could do was to focus upon something useful and then work very hard at it.”  At Brookline High, another of our fundamental mantras is “Work Hard Over Time.”  No BHS student has ever returned to us saying that they worked too hard at Brookline High.

To the contrary, thousands of BHS alumni have returned to thank us for preparing them well academically and socially for their next steps.  HARD WORK OVER TIME matters!

And finally, the Sperber Award is about leadership.  School principals live at the schoolhouse, but face great demands from agencies, organizations, and institutions beyond the schoolhouse.  The United States Department of Education makes demands; the Massachusetts Department of Education makes demands; our accrediting agency, the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), makes demands; the College Board makes demands; and a variety of interest groups – legitimate and credible people who are deeply interested in the health, safety, and well-being of our students, our community, and our planet -- make demands.

School principals must respond to all of these constituencies and audiences, but school principals can easily become distracted by all of these demands, and can easily become less focused on the fundamental mission of the school – the academic and social/civic development of every child!  The academic and social/civic development of every child!

Wouldn't it be refreshing if those who make demands on us would sometimes say to us, “You guys at the schoolhouse are doing the really fundamental and important work with our kids, every day! How can we help you?”  We all need to face the right audience!  School leaders must help their communities face the right audience!  The right teachers that is the right audience!

So, let me be Eminem for a moment if there are yeasty teenagers in the house, if there are high school students in the house, please stand up, please stand up and, if their teachers are in the house, please stand up, please stand up THIS IS THE RIGHT AUDIENCE THIS IS THE HEART OF OUR ENTERPRISE WE NEED TO FACE THE RIGHT AUDIENCE!  PLEASE GIVE THEM THE ATTENTION, AND APPLAUSE THEY SO DESERVE!

THANK YOU. THANK YOU.  THANK YOU.

THANK YOU FOR HONORING ME AS A MEMBER OF THE RIGHT AUDIENCE.

PRESENTATION OF THE SPERBER AWARD - Dr. Robert Sperber

This is the third time the Brookline Education Foundation has given this leadership award. The first award went to Bill Grady, who directed Opportunity for Change, a high school program for teenagers with academic problems. I volunteered in that program and I saw firsthand the extraordinary efforts he made to help those children grow and adjust.

The second award went to Barbara Shea, who transformed the Lincoln School - a school with a history of low performance - into a center of academic excellence.

To gather information and impressions about our third award winner, I spent two hours during vacation week visiting with Bob Weintraub in his office at Brookline High School. It was one of the most exhilarating interviews I ever experienced. When Bob Weintraub talks about his students, his teachers, his parents, and his role as Head Master, he gets caught up in his own excitement. For a moment, I thought I was Superintendent again interviewing a candidate for the head master position and I almost caught myself yelling out loud -“You’ve got the job”.

How could you not be impressed with an educator who tells you he never had a bad day in his sixteen years as headmaster; who can’t wait to get to BHS so he can have fun interacting with students, teachers, staff, parents and the community; who gets his high from these interactions.

When we talked about leadership, and the characteristics of great leaders, he offered his formula- “You work with all your stake holders to arrive at a collective vision; you encourage and assist the stake holders in carrying out that vision; and then you miss no opportunities to thank people for their efforts -both large and small”.

When I asked Bob to talk about significant programs that have made a difference - he mentioned two - the BHS Tutorial Program and The African American Scholars Program. Both programs are unique. One program changes the paradigm for Special Education and the Scholars Program changes the approach to educating African American students.

The BHS Tutorial Program utilizes the services of two high school teachers from the Math, Social Studies, World Language, and Science Departments who work with ten students four times a week in a tutorial setting providing content-based instruction.

For two years, the high school ran a pilot tutorial program for forty students and compared the results with forty other students whose academic profiles were almost identical who were taught in the Learning Center. All eighty students had diagnosed disabilities. The research conclusions were dramatic. According to Dr. Thomas Hehir of Harvard, “Students in the tutorial program made better progress than those in the Learning Center….  Many of these students have needs that can best be served within regular education and the Tutorial Program is an innovative and impressive attempt to do just that.”

Beginning in 2005-2006, supported by the research findings, the Tutorial Program was expanded from forty to two hundred and ten students. When this transforming program began there were two hundred and forty students in the Learning Center; today, only one hundred and sixty students.

The African American Scholars Program focuses on preparing its students to become, in the words of Dr. Weintraub “exemplary citizens and leaders of our country and of our world”. The program’s mission is to assist the scholars to achieve higher GPAs, higher scores on standardized tests, increase their enrollment in honors and AP courses, gain admission to the National Honor Society and get into leading colleges and universities. It achieves these goals by recruiting African American students in grades nine through twelve with a GPA of 2.7. The students are provided with a mentor and participate in year long activities and curricula designed to encourage academic success. Students attend twice weekly seminars which focus on adjustment to the high school, SAT prep, and are provided academic support and preparation for college. They attend a monthly speakers series featuring African American intellectuals and community leaders. Parental support and involvement is a key part of the program. The Scholars also visit the elementary schools and talk with African American students, encouraging them to achieve.

The results are stunning. The English/Language Arts MCAS scores in 2005 went from 32% advanced and proficient scores to 74% in 2007- a 131% difference and the Math MCAS scores went from 36% in 2005 to 67% in 2007- an 86% difference.

As I was leaving his office, I turned to Bob, still turned on by our two hour conversation and said,” We would have made an exciting team”.

Although I won’t be able to satisfy my fantasy of working with this inspirational national figure in secondary education, I can however recognize his many contributions to BHS by presenting Dr. Robert Weintraub with the Robert I. Sperber Leadership Award on behalf of the Brookline Education Foundation.

REMARKS BY MARY BURCHENAL - The Tao of Bob

When I arrived to teach at Brookline High in the fall of 1990, Bob was beginning his second year as Assistant Headmaster.  Frankly, I was too busy and too new to pay much attention to him.  However, I could feel a palpable difference when, two years later, he took over as Acting Headmaster.  If truth be told, at first the change was a tad jarring.  We had gone from a rather distant leader to this bearded guy from Queens, roaming the halls, announcing that Brookline High School was the best high school, not in the state, not in the country, but in the cosmos.

Let me set thc scene further. Although I was a few years out of college, I was still in the thrall of my intellectual heroes.  For example, I had been seduced by Dostoevskys Underground Man, a highly educated fellow who, from his Hamlet-like existential paralysis, said, men of action are active just because they are stupid and limited.  I felt at home at Brookline because I found many colleagues of a similar disposition: hypereducated, a tad cynical, and interested in the life of the MIND.

And here comes this guy in cowboy boots, hugging people in the halls. 

Needless to say, Bobs exuberant cheerleading was at first met with skepticism.  As a school we were better known for our cool and distant irony than our pom-pom-waving.  Who was this guy?  Wasnt he a little, well, MUCH?  Why was he always so darned cheerful?  Why was he suddenly appearing everywhere at once:  in the classrooms, offices, hallways?  Why didnt he sit down?

Fortunately, our cool had no dampening effect on Bobs passion. It took a couple of years for us to realize that this headmaster wasnt just talking a big game.  Here is what we came to see:  Bob Weintraub is a man of action.  He works harder and longer, week after week, year after year, than anyone else in the building (and thats going some). And at home after midnight, when he finishes writing a proposal for a new initiative, or correcting a set of freshman papers, or writing a note to a sick colleague, he picks up the BHS Yearbook before bed so he can memorize more student names.

Bob gets things done because he recognizes and hires talented people who love kids.  He gets things done because he understands politics  -- which he once defined to me as the means by which a group finds out what it believes, a definition which took the legs right out from under my cynicism.  He gets things done because he has a vision:  not just freedom and responsibility, but a vision of academic integrity, of civic involvement, of pride in hard work, of acceptance of human imperfection, and of aggressive optimism... what I now call Bobtimism.

And despite what Dostoevskys Underground Man said, this man of action was anything but stupid and limited.

Elon Fischer remembers that when he arrived here after teaching at another high school, he was astounded by the high level of discussion at the first faculty meeting.  He could see this tone came from Bob, who begins every school year with quotations from the greats:  Kierkegaard, Schlesinger, Jim Walsh, Mike Frantz.  This year, using a passage from Saint-Exupery, Bob urged the staff not just to give orders and assign boatbuilding tasks, but to teach our students to yearn for the vast and endless sea.  In this way and others, Bob encourages deep thinking and a high level of discussion --which in turn allows us to grapple with major educational challenges. As Elon says, Bob is always looking up. Sitting around and not changing anything is not an option. If you work for Bob, you, too, yearn for the vast and endless sea, and you throw yourself into building the boat to get there.

As a result, sixteen years later, under Bobs leadership, Brookline High is a much stronger, more unified school.  We have maintained the highest academic standards, while becoming a more human, dynamic place. From his first days as Headmaster, he has preached the importance of each students having a strong relationship with at least one adult in the building.  Bob infuses everything he does with his belief in the power of relationship.

The students, parents and staff now know and trust him.  His alert and flexible intelligence makes him adept in the insanely varied situations a typical school day throws at him. His courage and confidence allow him to make tough decisions, to stand up to people who disagree with him, and to take risks when he knows the results for students will be worth it.  His boyish sense of humor allows him to recognize absurdity wherever it lies, putting problems constantly in perspective instead of letting them overwhelm us.

Bob often cites Oliver Wendell Holmes desire to find simplicity on the other side of complexity.  Bob believes in working through complex problems, not around them.  Being Big Daddy to over 2000 adults and teenagers is, for most mortals, a crushing job, demanding varied skills, and Bobs success as teacher, policy-maker, disciplinarian, event coordinator, chief strategist, guru, father confessor, trash picker upper, is difficult to set down in any space. What I can say is that the Underground Man was paralyzed by complexity.  Bob Weintraub is energized by it.  He seems to be most fully himself, most fully alive when in the midst of crisis.  He gives off this perverse glow.

If I were going to reach simplicity on the other side of the complexity of  Bob  -- in other words attempt to uncover the Tao of Bob, I would venture that what most makes Bob such a powerful leader is his inexhaustible, irrational joy in existence. Bob Weintraub loves people, he loves life, and, indeed, he loves education because its the best way he knows to gather  kids together and swing open the doors to that life he loves. 

Luckily for all of us and for this school, his warm spirit is contagious.  Luckily for me, Bob has become not just a mentor, but a close friend.  More than any other single person, he is responsible for BHS feeling like HOME to me. On a bad day all it takes is five minutes with Bob in the cafeteria or outside on the steps after school or in his office (eating his candy), and suddenly, my job seems, well, like FUN.  IMPORTANT fun.  Why would I want to do anything else? 

I hope this speech communicates some small part of my enormous respect, gratitude, and affection for our Guest of Honor.  Bob, I always joke with you that I work hard in order to make you look good.  All I can say is:  first, Im only half-joking.  Second... look, my work seems to be paying off!

One day a couple of years back I walked into the Atrium, and there, in the middle of the marble lobby, stood a huge paper mache sculpture of Bob Weintraub.  BHS art students had created it and had installed it in secret the night before.  The sculpture was a loving portrayal of Bob, capturing his ear-to-ear grin, his glasses, his crazy tie, his perpetual motion.  Yes, I immediately thought.  Bob is the kind of leader, here at the best school in the cosmos, who gets and deserves a statue before hes even dead.

Yes, I am thinking now.  He also deserves the Sperber Award.

REMARKS BY STEVE LANTOS

When Skye asked if I'd speak at Bob's ceremony, I asked her what the tone of the speech should be. She said, " I am hoping that your remarks will be touching and a little irreverent at the same time." At the expense of words already spoken . . . and my continued employment, here goes.

I'm a 'Bob Fan'. 

Eighteen years ago, Bob Weintraub, then the first-ever Assistant Headmaster at BHS, applied for his current position as Headmaster. No one was sure if he was allowed to apply for the job, so a number of us staff began a 'Bob Fan Club' and circulated a clipboard to petition the School Committee to allow him to be considered for the position. The printing room in the UA building made up buttons with his then-bearded visage and the Brookline Tab ran a brief human interest story that the staff at Brookline High School were rallying around their relatively new, young assistant headmaster to become their leader. We had all come to know Bob well in his first few years as the headmaster's assistant: slavishly hard-working, witty, personal and perceptive, peripatetic, risk-taking, funny, ready to use a choice Yiddish phrase with a mostly faded but still slightly detectable Bronx accent, two kids in the grade schools, and a passionate educator who loved teaching, learning, and getting to know each student and teacher well. Bob showed up in his new role the following September having memorized over the summer the names and faces of the entire set of 1800 students from the annual Murivian yearbook, one of so many personal touches that keep his daily focus on students and teaching.

What brought this man to our school? Bob has worn many hats He has served as a prison counselor, a waiter on a ship, worked in a button factory, was the NY City Public Schools Golf Champ (like there was stiff competition?), worked on a kibbutz, played a hippy when he met Judy, and now lives works, dines, plays, and prays in the same town where he has worked for over 25 years.

Staff joke that Bob has profound ADD/ADHD and should really get tested sometime. I'll admit that having a conversation in the cafeteria or at a staff breakfast with Bob is a trying exercise in watching his eyes dart about. I've come to understand that this is just Bob multi-tasking and always working overtime. He's never settled with business as usual or 'cruise control'. Of his many mantras, 'Ready, Fire, Aim' is his declaration to act, and remain in motion, often considering consequences later. I don't believe this. Bob always considers consequences in his actions, like a chess player might with each move. And he's always moving. To paraphrase astronaut Gene Krantz's character in the film documentary 'Apollo 13', in Bob's universe, 'Status quo is not an option!' We've come to expect, tolerate, study, value, and learn from Bob's dynamic style. He has never mandated a new program or issued an edict without applying it to himself. Examples abound, including joining a summer Critical Friends study group as part of faculty professional development, rappelling from a rope down the wall of the quadrangle in support of the Rock Climbing course, dressing up and acting out as the scandalous 'Ali G' on stage as a fellow cast member of the annual faculty talent show 'Moonlighting', teaching English, and on and on. As our leader, Bob is in every way each one of us, and more so. There are countless other examples over the years of Bob as a profligate and prophet, prodder and pedagogue, guiding his faculty by challenging, moving, and uplifting us intellectually and professionally as educators of the school and citizens of the world.

On reaching consensus: early on in my career, Bob called me at home lat one night. It was Bob. He needed advice about an administrative hire. And he was asking me?! I was flattered, only to learn the next day that half the staff received the same call. Bob does his homework, and is famous for staying up late doing it. Raise your hands in the house if you have at some point been polled, side-bared, or taken into confidence by this man?

Bob is passionate about solving the achievement gap, and unflinchingly resolved to do so one child at a time. This expressed mission has been his Ahab's Whale since becoming Headmaster. Tripod, African American Scholars, Day of Equity, Heart of Brookline all come to mind as Bob's brainchildren to confront the racial inequity in achievement head-on. Where other leaders might resign themselves to this complicated educational dilemma, Bob will simply not let it go. His pragmatism, creativity, and single-minded determination to take down the gap at BHS is Bob's pragmatic 'can't quit' spirit and belief in every child. I still have hanging above my desk at home a message Bob wrote to faculty in the early 90s:

Yesterday's model for how kids learn can no longer serve our children today. We must engage and challenge our kids as we have never done before

Bob's passionate writing and reflections to us about events in our daily lives as educators and citizens should be compiled in a book. It will be a whimsical, gripping, historical, moving account of the fast times at Brookline High School in the 1990s. It will be a best seller.

Bob as Headcheerleader: Bob is genuinely upset when 'US News & World Report' ranks Brookline anything less than #1, when Newton wins at Thanksgiving, when the papers write anything unflattering about BHS, when fewer than a dozen kids get into top schools, when one student from somewhere in the middle does not have at least one adult in the building with whom s/he can connect, and when a student in some way violates another of Bob's core beliefs: Freedom with responsibility, liberty and duty, that's the deal! Another of Bob's mantras, that ninth graders hear from their first day in the building and repeatedly over their four years at BHS, Bob is righteous about being a good citizen of our community and the world. If Bob had to go to the mountaintop, it is this phrase that would be carved into his tablets and on display in the Atrium. Instead, the phrase hangs prominently above his office desk, alongside a print of Picasso's Guernica, family photos, monsters from Maurice Sendak's Where The Wild Things Are, and a picture of his beloved Jackie Robinson. And like reciting the Hebrew Shema, his single Freedom and responsibility prayer sums up Bob's entire unyielding belief in public education -- that weighing individual freedom with responsibility is fundamental to building each and every student's moral, ethical, and political core. As the building's guiding philosophy, he lives by it daily and demands that all others in our school community do the same.

Spring 1993. The mood in the auditorium was hushed. A recent racial incident had divided members of the staff and exploded in the media. Bob called everyone to the auditorium for a challenging conversation and understanding about race relations at BHS. There were accusations, misunderstandings, and division amongst many. It was tense and prickly. And there was Bob at the podium, the least enviable place to be, yet there was Bob - at his finest, not shirking from the difficult conversation or hard feelings, but confronting them head-on and forcing others around him to see, hear, and process others' points of view, while pushing everyone to see the bigger picture – a harmony and shared mission to learn from our differences and come to a consensus in understanding. This moment underscored Bob's philosophy, strength, and determination to push us as a faculty and community into risky areas with his unwavering stance at the podium. There are countless examples over the years of Bob as leader and prophet, guiding his faculty by challenging, prodding, moving, and uplifting us intellectually and pedagogically as educators of the school and citizens of the world.

Summer 1998.  Bob had a mission for the upcoming year to get the High School to address 'middle kids', students who slip through the cracks and should be doing better. To solve this educational dilemma, we're meeting at 8 a.m. on a beautiful mid-August morning at Mary Burchenal's house in Dedham. I'm a fast biker but have trouble keeping up with Bob – 15 years my senior - speeding ahead of me along Brookline's back roads in his biker Lycra®, not so mindful of the pot-holes and opening car doors. We spent the afternoon discussing the problem, tinkering with programs and designing new ones to address this issue. I left the meeting energized for the new year and idealistically ready to tackle a seemingly intractable problem in schools. In Bob's school, no educational concern at BHS can be left unaddressed and every problem in our school – big and small – must be examined and acted upon. Bob as Headvisionary has this effect on us all as educators.

Fall 2007.  Talking to Bob about the possible town override is like speaking with a general about to bring his troops to battle. He's almost giddy about the possibilities a successful override will bring to the high school: A new schedule, financing for new programs, increased teacher pay. The work he's already done to align the major players, politics, and media are part of his artful, creative, assured determination to simply do what's best for his staff and students. The cache that Bob has built in the community is powerful, allowing him to constantly articulate the need within and beyond the schoolhouse for funding and resources to provide the most for Brookline students. However the vote goes, we know that Bob was riding his white horse in front of the charge.

Bob develops personal connections and meaningful relationships with every adult in the building. In our time together, I've come to learn from, live with, value, respect, question, treasure, abide by, seek guidance from, and ultimately love my relationship with him. To so many of us teachers and students, Bob is at once mentor, a teacher's teacher, fatherly, avuncular (more in recent years), Headcoach and helmsman, principal and principled, longtime part-time professor of pedagogy, politico and politician, sports fan and everyman, moralist and mensch. He is determined, equitable, expressive, an intellectual, nuanced, positive, philosophical, pragmatic, questioning, righteous, an urbane cowboy (those boots . . . ), valued, witty, zealous, zanily optimistic, and just extraordinary.

I know that I speak for over 250 current colleagues and many, many more over the years, thousands of students and their families, and the larger Brookline community in saying: 

We're all Bob Fans.

Presentation of 2008 Robert I. Sperber award
Photos by Ed Malitsky

On May 4, 2008, the Robert I. Sperber Award for Administrative Leadership was presented to Dr. Robert Weintraub during a festive program and reception held at Brookline High School. Over 350 people attended the event.

The program included entertainment by the BHS Testostatones and many moving tributes by BHS faculty and students. In addition, thirteen friends and family members shared just what it is that they "like about Bob."

Dr. Robert Sperber made the presentation to Dr. Weintraub. The Sperber Award, which is given every five years, honors an educator whose excellence in administrative management and strong leadership skills have brought notable improvement to the Brookline School System.

Brookline Education Foundation Executive Director Skye Kramer presented Dr. Weintraub with a proclamation from the Massachusetts State House of Representatives.

Following the program, a reception was held in the Brookline High School atrium. Among those assembled was the 2003 Sperber Award Honoree, Barbara Shea, former principal of the William H. Lincoln School.

Also present were (from left to right) former Superintendents of Schools, Dr. James Walsh and Dr. Robert Sperber, and present Superintendent, Dr. William Lupini.