Finalists chosen for names for 5 schools

Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2005 | 11:10 a.m.

A Clark County School District committee on Monday recommended naming a new school after former Superintendent Claude Perkins, who resigned in 1981 after a three-year tenure fraught with controversy.

In the last year there has been a groundswell of support for naming a school after Perkins, who despite clashes with some educators and community members, is credited with strengthening the district's academic requirements and increasing the number of minority and female administrators. He is currently associate vice president of academic affairs at Albany State University in Georgia.

"I'm glad to see the School Names Committee stand up and finally do the right thing," said Louis Overstreet, executive director of the Urban Chamber of Commerce which has campaigned on Perkins' behalf for years. "The members are to be commended for getting over the political stumbling blocks and moving forward toward honoring Claude Perkins in this long overdue manner."

The final decision on school names rests with the Clark County School Board, which draws selections from a list of committee recommendations.

The 2005 Legislature approved a resolution urging the district name a school after Perkins, Clark County's only black superintendent. Gov. Kenny Guinn, who was district superintendent when he hired Perkins in 1971, said in February interview with the Las Vegas Sun that his former protege deserved the honor.

Monday the committee sent to the School Board a list of names for five new elementary schools and a middle school to be built.

In addition to the former superintendent, the list includes a Hispanic newspaper publisher, a nun, a former school official and a community leader.

Names for elementary schools that will be built in 2007 and 2008 include:

Also, a middle school will be named for Eddie Escobido, owner and publisher of El Mundo, a Spanish language newspaper. He brought Hispanic radio and films to Las Vegas and believes that parents, not just teachers, educate children.

The finalists were chosen from a list of 200 applicants and are to be considered by the School Board in October, said board President Larry Mason, who also serves on the committee.

The committee also recommended naming the Frank Lamping Elementary School Library after Betty Lee Lamping and Chaparral High School's theater after Anthony Zuiker, writer and producer of the television series "CSI."

A recommendation to name the Las Vegas Academy's theater after Paul and Sue Lowden was held for further consideration. Paul Lowden is president and CEO of Archon Corporation and Sue Lowden is a former state senator.

For Monday night's meeting, more than 500 people crammed the Education Center on East Flamingo Road near Eastern Avenue to speak for and applaud their favorites. Families and friends spilled into the halls and the parking lot of the building.

Mason had to clear the aisles of the center's auditorium before the hearing began at 6 p.m.

Some of the audience members waved signs with names and photos of the person they nominated, others brought thick binders full of endorsement letters to the committee.

The family of Isaac Perez, a Ruth Fyfe Elementary School custodian who was kidnapped at gunpoint and killed by a 16-year-old thief whom Perez had caught ransacking the principal's office, nominated Perez because of his love for learning.

At the time of his death, Perez was going to school to become a teacher. Before his night shift, he worked at other schools with family members.

Sheriff Bill Young urged a school to be named after former Sheriff Jerry Keller and his wife, Charlotte, who taught special education students.

"Every single person deserves to have a school named after them," Young said, staying through the three-hour hearing before the vote was taken.

Other Southern Nevada residents nominated, but not chosen, are historian Frank Wright; Dr. Don L. Christensen, first pediatric surgeon in Las Vegas; former Gov. Robert List; former school Superintendent Robert Wentz; former county health officer Dr. Otto Ravenholt; columnist Celeste Lowe; and Carolyn Goodman, co-founder and president of the Meadows School and wife of Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman.

School Board member Sheila Moulton, who is also on the committee, described the naming of schools as "a very good history lesson."

"It is always a joy and an experience to listen to the history of Southern Nevada," Mason said.

Sun reporter Emily Richmond contributed to this story.