East Toledo: Devotion to children earns her honors

Carol Ann Barailloux retired with 30 years of Toledo service.

Those who worked alongside her said they appreciated her dedication to helping children through their problems so they could concentrate on learning.

Carol Ann Barailloux, who retired as principal of Navarre Elementary School this year, was honored at a recent Toledo Public Schools Board of Education meeting for her 30 years of outstanding service at TPS schools.

"She cares about these kids so much and will go above and beyond what's expected of her as a principal to do what's best for each child," said Michelle Hammond, who has been a fifth-grade teacher at Navarre for seven years.

Terry Snider, a secretary at Navarre, said Mrs. Barailloux would drop whatever she was doing if a child needed her, which required her to come in on weekends to finish her paperwork.

"I've been through a few principals and she was the best principal that I ever worked for," she said. "She definitely went beyond her job description. She would always encourage people, if they had a problem, to come and see her."

Mrs. Barailloux was born in 1944 and attended Toledo schools while growing up. She moved to Oregon and began her 35 years of teaching in Ohio education in 1969 as a substitute teacher for TPS, and taught special education from 1971 until 1974 at Lake and Northwood local schools.

She returned to Toledo schools in 1974 to teach special education for a few years at the now DeVeaux Junior High School and stayed there for about eight more years to teach second grade. She then moved to Longfellow Elementary School to teach third grade.

"Things kind of blend together from one year to another, but I was just in love with wherever I went at the time," Mrs. Barailloux said.

She began teaching sixth grade in 1986, where she stayed for 10 years and said she enjoyed teaching on a team with three other teachers. But because of her aspirations to become a principal, she got her master's degree in administration and supervision during this time.

"I didn't do it right away because I was comfortable in the teaching position at the time," she said. "I knew in order to do it, you had to devote more hours."

But she was ready to devote those extra hours when she left Longfellow in 1996 to take the intern assistant principal position at Whittier Elementary School and accepted the assistant principal position at Oakdale Elementary School in 1997.

Before retiring, she became principal of Navarre Elementary School from 1997 to 2004, which she said was not as predictable as being a teacher.

"It was exciting, and every day you weren't sure what was going to come," she said. "I'm so glad because I got to work with the greatest bunch of people the whole time I was there. It became a family."

And her "family" at Navarre feels the same way about her.

"When I came here, Carol had a little basket on my desk that said 'Welcome to Navarre,'●" said acting principal Marie Bungard. "I knew I was going to be comfortable here from then on."

She said it was hard to see her colleague retire, but plans to run the school the way Mrs. Barailloux did.

"Things will go on as they always do," Ms. Bungard said, "but she will be missed."