Oak Park resident Sanna Evans said the reason she moved to the village nine years ago was largely because of the reputation of Lincoln Elementary School and its principal, Cathy Hamilton.
Evans was one of several dozen people at an open house hosted Sunday afternoon by the school’s PTO in honor of the departing principal. Teachers, parents, children and Hamilton’s family members gathered on the school’s blacktop to eat cake and other desserts. Many of the attendees wore stickers with Hamilton’s face on them, and several students greeted the longtime principal with a hug.
Hamilton will be leaving her post after a total 26 years spent working at the school and 14 years as its principal. She applied for an early retirement option in January 2013, but because the state legislature did not extend the law, the Teacher Retirement System’s early retirement option expired in July 2015.
Parents and teachers at the elementary school pushed for months through the fall and early months of this year to keep Hamilton as principal of Lincoln for the next three years to ensure she received her full pension. The Oak Park District 97 school board and Superintendent Carol Kelley opted, however, to move forward with a search for a new principal. Lisa Bucciarelli-Carlos, who most recently served as principal of Kelly High School in Chicago, was appointed by the board in March to serve as Lincoln’s new principal, effective July 1.
Hamilton said at the open house that she worked with Kelley and the school board, and they were able to find a solution that would allow her to collect her full pension. Following her departure from Lincoln, Hamilton said she’ll be working out of the district’s central office as the school district’s administrator for substitutes and teaching assistants.
The outpouring of community support for her as principal and the desire by parents and teachers to keep her on as principal “fills my heart I sometimes just can’t even find the words,” Hamilton said.
She said the elementary school feels like home.
“I’m proud of the work I’ve done over the years, and I couldn’t have come into a community with more supportive parents, great staff and the kids. Obviously, they’re wonderful,” Hamilton said.
She said she’s communicating with Bucciarelli-Carlos almost daily via text and email. Hamilton said the school is “going to be in great hands” and that Bucciarelli-Carlos “is wonderful, very capable, and she’s very excited to be here.”
Evans, a mother of a Lincoln graduate and a current student at the school, said the sense of community she felt at the elementary school is largely due to Hamilton’s leadership.
“I’m eternally grateful to her,” she said. “She’s a remarkable woman.”
A fourth-grade teacher at Lincoln, Karri Spillane, said she’s sad to see Hamilton leave the school.
“She’s always been here for us teachers, and she’s really been here for me because I lost my husband this year. … She’s a friend; she’s a family member,” Spillane said.
Oak Park Police Officer John Rumoro, who has served as school officer at Lincoln for the past 18 years, said Hamilton “practically helped raise my kids.” He said all three of his children are Lincoln graduates.
The first time Rumoro said he worked closely with Hamilton was in 2006 when one of the school’s teachers fell unconscious in a hallway due to a heart condition.
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“Ms. Hamilton gave her CPR and operated the (automated external defibrillator) machine, and she saved her life,” he said. Rumoro said Hamilton handled the situation like a seasoned first responder and also ensured that no students were aware of what had happened.
“I was very impressed at the way she handled that. It was way beyond the call of duty as a principal,” he said.
Becki Zobel, co-president of the Lincoln PTO, said the organization hosted the open house for Hamilton to give the community an opportunity to say goodbye to the beloved principal.
“She’s a pillar in our community,” Zobel said. “She’s been at Lincoln for nearly 30 years, and she has meant a lot to the teachers and she’s meant a lot to the families. She’s taken a personal interest in people’s lives. She’s been a strong part of the community for all these years, and she’s very well loved and very well respected.”
Lee V. Gaines is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.