Former education director remembered with 'celebration' of his life.
The family of the late Silvio Sauro, longtime Director of the Etobicoke Board of Education, is holding a celebration of his life this Sunday. He is pictured here with his wife Jean and four daughters on his 80th birthday.
Courtesy photo
Silvio Sauro never wanted a funeral, nor any tears to be shed over his loss - he wanted a party.
And that's just the wish the Sauro family will be honouring this weekend when they hold a 'celebration' of the late, longtime Etobicoke Director of Education's life.
"He didn't believe in having a funeral and crying and anything like that, he wanted to have a party, so that's what we're going to have," Sauro's widow, Jean, told The Guardian this week of the celebration, which is set to take place on Sunday, Jan. 15. "There will be wine and there will definitely be music."
All who knew Sauro are welcome to come and share memories at Panemonte Banquet Centre, 220 Humberline Dr. from 1 to 5 p.m.
Sauro passed away peacefully on Dec. 14 at Trillium Health Centre in Mississauga at age 82. He is survived by his wife Jean and four daughters, Kathy, Donna, Pam and Sylvia.
Born on March 17, 1929 to a United Church clergyman and soprano singer, Jean said Sauro came from a very musical family - a passion he carried with him throughout his life.
It was music, in fact, that brought Jean and Sauro together for the first time in high school.
"I play the violin, and in Grade 9 at North Toronto Collegiate I met my future sister-in-law, who used to be my accompanist," she recalled. "Her family had a piano because they were all musical, so I would go to her house to rehearse with her."
It was there she met her future husband who, at first, paid her little attention.
"It took a while before he noticed me, but eventually he came around, and he did accompany me," she added. The pair were married 59 years, together raising a family of four girls.
Family, said Sauro's sister Sylvia Lowry, remained of the utmost importance to him throughout his life. And family get-togethers were most often held at one of the two adjacent cottages in Muskoka that Sauro and Jean bought as a retreat for their extended family and friends to enjoy time together.
Thanksgiving weekend at the cottage was always a highlight for the Sauro family, Lowry said.
"With games, music and laughter, these weekends were a high point of the year for us all," she remembered. "A special feature was a Thanksgiving hymn, which we made our own by adding a verse each year to record the happy and sad events in the family during the previous year. We began it in the early 1970s, and by 2011 the song lasted about 25 minutes - bringing tears and smiles as we reviewed our family history in song."
While music was his passion, and family was his heart, it is in education that Sauro leaves his most lasting legacy.
He began his teaching career with the Toronto Board of Education in 1949, but soon moved to the Etobicoke board, where he began teaching at Lambton Kingsway Junior Middle School. From there he moved on to Queensland Public School, Norseman Junior Middle School, The Elms Junior Middle School, and Humber Heights School, where he served as either teacher, vice principal or principal for nearly 20 years.
In 1967, Sauro was appointed to the central board office, where he served as an area superintendent. Over the years, he would go on to fulfill the roles of Educational Sociological Officer, Superintendent of Special Education, Superintendent of Programmes, Superintendent of Administration, and Associate Director.
Then, in January 1983, he became the Director of Education and Secretary-Treasurer - a capacity he served in until his retirement in January 1989.
Etobicoke Centre MPP Donna Cansfield served as a trustee under Sauro for just a year in 1988, but the two remained friends for years.
"Silvio was the director in Etobicoke for a long time, and well-loved. He was a wonderful man - very strong, very firm," she recalled. "He was a very good, effective director of education who put in some pretty remarkable things in his time."
Sauro's strong guidance, Cansfield said, led the board through one of the lowest points in its history - the closure of some 32 of its schools.
"Silvio had to deal with that, and it was not easy," she said. "It was a difficult time, but he handled it with a lot of class and left the board a wonderful legacy."