Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Sam Rotolo was the longtime principal at Batavia Junior High School, which in 2001 was renamed Rotolo Middle School.

Mr. Rotolo was a role model for students and teachers alike, those who knew him said.

“He had a lasting impact on generations of children, including myself, and was a powerful inspiration to scores of teachers that wanted to be like him,” said Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke, who attended White Elementary School in Batavia, where Mr. Rotolo was principal early in his career.

Mr. Rotolo, 89, died of complications related to a recent fall on Sunday, March 29, at Delnor Hospital in Geneva, his family said. He was a resident of Geneva.

“Sam took a special interest in everybody — achievers, underachievers, students and teachers alike,” said Schielke, who is in his ninth term. “He had this wonderful way of making you feel important, like you had something really special to offer. I was only about 7, but I can still remember him pulling me aside and teasingly saying to me, ‘Jeffery, I’m keeping an eye on you because you seem to catch on to things quickly.'”

Born in Chicago to Sicilian immigrants and raised in the Bridgeport neighborhood, Mr. Rotolo graduated from high school and joined the Army during World War II. From 1944 to 1946 he served in Europe, and he was at the Battle of the Bulge, his family said.

After his discharge, he returned to Chicago and earned a bachelor’s degree at Northern Illinois University, where he later obtained a master’s degree. For four years he taught at the Illinois State Training School for Boys in St. Charles, now called the Illinois Youth Center.

“He learned a lot during his time there, working with some challenging kids,” said his daughter, Susan Rizzo. “But he’d always say, ‘There are no bad kids. There are just kids in bad situations.'”

During the early 1950s, Mr. Rotolo began teaching physical education and science at White Elementary, where he was appointed principal in 1956. That same year he became the first principal of Batavia Junior High School, where he remained until retiring in 1989.

More Top Picks 13 Best Noise Canceling Headphones For Students

In 1980 he was named Kane County Principal of the Year and given the Award for Excellence in Education for Outstanding School Administrators by the state superintendent of education.

“He was a mentor to me and so many other teachers,” said former colleague Page McCloud, a retired teacher from Batavia Junior High School. “He taught me how to be a real advocate for my students, to cheer them on and help them realize their fullest potential.

“Whenever I was in a tough situation, I’d think, ‘What would Sam do?'”

In 2006, Mr. Rotolo’s Italian heritage made local news when protesting parents at the junior high filed a lawsuit to stop a play, a comedy written by one of its teachers about “little mobsters,” saying it portrayed offensive stereotypes of Italian-Americans. In the end, school officials stood behind the production.

When asked to comment, family members said Mr. Rotolo defended the teacher — whom he had worked with before retiring — saying, “He’s a fine young man who gets a lot out of the kids. He would never do anything to ridicule any ethnic group.”

“Sam was a person of integrity, who was always fair, positive and gave good advice,” McCloud said.

In his retirement, Mr. Rotolo served on the board of directors for Two Rivers Head Start, the Batavia Council on Aging and the Secondary Principals Association.

Other survivors include his wife of 50 years, Marlene; two other daughters, Sharon Hansen and Kathy Cox; and five grandchildren.

Services were held.

Giangrasse Kates is a freelance reporter for the baiduhai.