It was a bit surreal to attend the funeral of prominent educator Syd Wise on October 8, a man I considered a good friend.
I knew Syd since I was a kid. He and my parents travelled in the same social circles, he was once the principal of my former Wagar High School and his son Steven and I go back to when we were in our teens. However, it was when I was first hired as the communications and marketing specialist for the English Montreal School Board in February 1999 that we really became close. I had assumed this post six months into the berth of linguistic school boards in Quebec. The Quebec government had discarded the former religious model in public education. Pauline Marois was the Education Minister at the time and her first action towards the EMSB (already seen as the high profile anglo board in the province) was to pick a fight and hand a chunk of its surplus revenue generating ($1.8 million a year) property to the French boards. It was tense time and I had a big learning curve. As I began to familiarize myself with these duties in my new office in walked Syd and in a fatherly way he put his hand on my shoulder and said : "Breath easy Mike, you will pick all of this up in no time."
Syd was only semi-retired at this time. Retired from being a principal, but still very busy teaching at different levels and collecting artwork. As the school commissioner for Côte Saint-Luc, he was very proactive in everything he did. Syd saw this work as a passion. He loved every minute of it and wanted nothing more than to see improvements in the system. While there may have been political divisions among elected officials, he got along and was liked by everyone.
Very often Syd was my "go to" guy when the media would call for a spokesman on a particular subject. He was so articulate and commanded instant respect. After Wagar High School closed and the building became the home of a school for special needs teens (John Grant) and adult learners (Marymount Adult Centre), Syd came to my office one day with an idea. He wanted to rename the building after someone who saved Jews during the Holocaust and link this to an education program bringing Jewish and non-Jewish students together. He worked hard on this initiative and in no time at all Laurier Macdonald High School in St. Léonard had been twinned with Bialik High School in Côte Saint-Luc. That was 10 years ago and today that program continues to thrive and also includes schools with non-Jewish population visiting the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Two years ago, when the Parti Québecois came up with its intolerant Charter of Values, Syd grabbed a piece of scrap paper at one meeting of the EMSB Council and then approached Chairman Angela Mancini. He wanted her support for a resolution which would firmly state that the EMSB would refuse to implement any legislation calling upon them to force members of different cultural groups to remove items of a religious nature in the classroom. The Chaiman agreed and the EMSB made national headlines as it stood up to the PQ. That Charter never passed.
It is sad though that Syd did not live to see his greatest dream come to fruition: the rebirth of Wagar High School. It closed in 2005 due to low enrolment, but Syd felt very strongly that it could succeed with a new mission. There were two attempts to relocate Royal Vale High School from NDG to the Wagar building and a few more to make it work as a specialty school, notably Sports Concentration. Efforts in 2013 went so far as having a new name, Wallenberg Academy, attached.
At the age of 78 just under a year ago, Syd decided to seek re-election for the EMSB. He was in excellent physical shape, still teaching several days a week and eager to make one last attempt at bringing a mainstream public high school back to Wagar. After campaigning vigorously he won the vote and was appointed Chairman of the Executive of the EMSB by his peers. A few months later he told us the bad news. He had cancer and while he would take all of the treatments doctors could provide, he was not optimistic of his chances.
Despite days when was so tired he could barely lift his head up, Syd remained committed to the EMSB agenda. He called me a few days a week to stay up to date and participated in all meetings by telephone. We last spoke a few weeks ago when he asked me whether he should step down. "Absolutely not," I told him. " Even if it is by telephone, you still have so much experience to share. And you are going to beat this thing!"
When I got the call from his son Steve on October 6 that Syd had passed away it just did not seem real. It brought me back to my own dad's passing just over three years ago.
Syd was one in a million, a man whose opinion I respected and whose company I cherished. I will deeply miss our regular chats. His memory will live on. That is for certain. To his wife Cecile, two children, six grandchildren and other extended family I extend my deepest sympathies.
