Minneapolis principal Sandra Woods dies at 79 April 1, 2021 8:17pm Text size Copy shortlink:
Remembering names of elementary school teachers presents a challenge for most adults. Recalling the name of an elementary principal is a test few could pass.
Unless that principal is Sandra Woods, who made a big impact at North Star West Elementary from 1994 to 2004. Woods spearheaded a contest for students to rename the school after a prominent Black American, Lucy Craft Laney, who founded the first school for Black children in Augusta, Ga.
Sherome Milon of Bloomington benefited from Woods leadership while he was a student at Lucy Laney from first to eighth grade in the late 1990s. She always told us we d be future college graduates, he said. As a kid in the inner city, I told myself I was going to be one too. Her stressing academics motivated me to go to college. Now I m teaching school and getting my master s degree.