Shirley Barber, longtime Clark County school trustee, dies at 83
Shirley Barber, a former Clark County School District trustee honored with a soon-to-open namesake elementary school in Henderson, has died.
Barber, 83, died in late January at her home in Las Vegas after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. In addition to serving three terms as a trustee, Barber was a former educator, an elementary school principal and chaired a number of committees in the county.
The Shirley A. Barber Elementary School is slated to open for the 2018-19 school year, at South Spencer Street and East Pyle Avenue in Henderson. The board approved her namesake in October.
Friends remembered her as a fierce advocate for children, especially those living in poverty, and a great mentor to younger administrators.
Beverly Mathis, a former principal who now works at the Public Education Foundation in Clark County, called Barber her “pickup.”
“I knew I could pick up the telephone and say ‘What would you do?’,” said Mathis, who got her first job as a principal at Booker Elementary School around 1994, near Fitzgerald Elementary School where Barber was principal at the time.
”She was always standing for what was best for children even if she had to stand alone. And sometimes she did have to stand alone,” she said.
She also stood alone at times during her 12 years on the Board of Trustees, said Trustee Linda Young, who ran for the District C seat in 2008 when Barber decided not to run again.
“There were some tense exchanges from time to time but she had the support of the community 1,000 percent, because they knew what she was trying to do,” Young said.
Young remembered a large book drive Barber coordinated for five or six years when they were both working as principals. The donation drive, which happened before school began, helped get more books into the hands of young children living in poverty who could not otherwise afford them.
“She was a pioneer in the educational arena, way before many of the things we incorporated in the school district today were incorporated,” Young said.
She is survived by her husband, Howard; children, Bryant Barber, Karen Barber, Loren (Greg) White and Bruce (Judy) Barber; six grandchildren and a sister
Visitation will be 1-2 p.m. Feb. 12, with a service following at Palm Mortuary, 1325 N. Main St., Las Vegas. Burial will be at 11 a.m.Feb.13, at Palm Valley View Memorial Park, 7600 S. Eastern Ave., Las Vegas.
The family requests donations in Barber’s name to the charities, Operation School Bell or Western High School Wrap Around Services in lieu of flowers.
Contact Meghin Delaney at 702-383-0281 or mdelaney@reviewjournal.com. Follow @MeghinDelaney on Twitter.
A lasting legacy
A number of programs spearheaded by Shirley Barber still exist in the school district today:
• Pre-First Grade Intersession Program developed in 1990 to prepare “at-risk” students for the first grade.
• Special Reading Laboratory for students performing under their grade level in language and reading. The labs raised the students’ language levels to enable maximum classroom achievement.
• The CCSD Academic Support & Community Service Center was developed to provide students with early exposure to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).
• Grandparent’s Day was inspirational to both children and adults alike since many students at the school lived with or near their grandparents. The program was conducted for seven years at two of her schools before becoming widely popular in the school district. The program is still in CCSD today.
• Father/Son & Mother/Daughter Banquets involved parents with their children in a school setting during the critical learning years. The Father/Son program was likened to Big Brothers since boys without fathers were matched with father figures for the affair.
• Career Day brought in local and State community professionals and role models (police, judges, denators, and even the governor) to give young students early exposure to and aspirations for the future.
