A Pair Of Winners

Henry Gold brings the title of assistant principal
of the year back to Ferndale High School.

DIANA LIEBERMAN
StaffWriter

T

he announcement of
Michigan's top assistant
principal for 1999 looks
much like the one issued
two years ago.
As in 1997, this year's title went to
an administrator from the Ferndale
Public Schools. The Michigan
Association of Secondary School
Principals (MASSP) selected Henry
Gold for the 1999 award; in 1997, the
title went to his co-worker and best
friend, Herbert Ivory.
"I call it Ivory's revenge," Gold said
jokingly of the award.
"Their friendship is a forerunner of
what I hope the world will look like in
the 21st century," says Ferndale
Superintendent Marcee Martin.
A shared commitment to students'
welfare is the glue that keeps the team
of Ivory and Gold together. Both
define the job of school administrator
as a teaching position — teaching
responsibility and respect, decision-
making and the implications of posi-
tive and negative behavior.
The two met in 1969 as newly
minted social studies teachers.
Ferndale hired about 50 new teachers
that year, and, before the first day of
class, they all took a bus tour of the
school district.
It was two years after the Detroit
riots, not a propitious time to start an
interracial friendship. Gold was the fair-
haired, athletic son of Holocaust sur-
vivors, who had continued his yeshiva
education while attending Berkley High
School. Ivory, at that time one of the
few black teachers in the district, was
the child of devout Southern Baptists.
As we went to the different areas
(of the district), this guy knew who
lived there, the racial and religious
makeup, what was going on," Ivory
remembers. "I was impressed — and I
myself graduated from Ferndale.

"

Diana Lieberman can be reached at

(248) 354-6060, ext. 247, or by e-mail
at dlieberm@thejewishnews.corn

The two quickly clicked, in person-
ality as well as interests. Their friend-
ship has withstood student unrest,
changing neighborhoods, standardized
tests, funding crises and all the other
irritants that have bombarded public
education during the past 31 years.
"Knowing Herb Ivory has made me
a better person," Gold says.
Last year, the district bought its
administrators cell phones, and now
the two are on the phone from morn-
ing 'til night, Martin says.
They tell me that, some days, they
talk to each other more than they talk
to their wives," she says.
Last year, the two vice principals
took over as interim co-principals.
When Gold realized his friend wanted
the job on a permanent basis, he
stepped aside.
"He told me, 'If you're
going to apply, then I'm not
going to apply,'" Ivory
says. "Henry Gold would
give you the shirt off his
back. I would describe
him as the best friend I
have.

Further expanding the ethnic mix,
Ferndale's new assistant principal,
Gary Sophiea, is of Lebanese descent.
"It sends a wonderful message to
students that you can be a success
whatever your background," Martin
says.
What's most outstanding about
Gold is his humanitarianism, she
adds. "He has a marvelous sense of
justice and the complete equality of all
people."
Gold, 53, of Lathrup Village, became
an assistant principal at Ferndale High
in 1988. A political science major at
Wayne State University, -he'd planned to
go into law, but a few education courses
changed his mind. He never lost his
interest in law, though, and in 1978,
earned a law degree from the
University of Detroit.
Ferndale High is one of
the most socially, eco-
nomically and religiously
diverse high schools in
the nation, according to
the MASSP. It's also one
of the first schools to offer
a Holocaust-related class,

which is taught by Barbara Demlow.
Gold's parents, Wolf and Felina, both
were survivors of Auschwitz, and he
makes a point of telling their story to
the class each year.
"We focus so much on the large
number of people who were killed,
and its right to do so," he says, But
we also need to focus on the survivors,
their courage, luck and those who
helped them survive."
As a child, Gold attended Yeshiva
Beth Yehudah and spent some time at a
yeshiva in Cleveland. "If you had told
me then, I never would have believed the
son of Southern Baptists would become
my best friend," he says.
In the school
situation, the two
function "like a
left hand and a
right hand,"
Gold says.
We click as a
team — it real-
' ly works." ❑

•Q •
0

Hemy Gold, Michigan
assistant principal of the
year, with best friend and ,
colleague Herbert holy,
the 1997 winner

11/19
1999

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