School celebrates life of a beloved teacher

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After Avanda Barber, 16, missed a number of days for health reasons at DeWitt Clinton High School last year, teacher Dorothy Lilly pulled the student aside to ask if she was okay.

While few knew it at the time, Ms. Lilly was suffering from illness herself.

At a commemoration for the teacher, who died on Jan. 12 after a battle with cancer, Avanda recounted the strength she drew from Ms. Lilly.

“She said, ‘If I can do this, you can do this.’ Ms. Lilly was like a mother to me, a grandmother to me. She loved me very much, and she told me that every day,” Avanda said in tears as she stood on a stage. “She cared so much about her students.”

The Jan. 22 ceremony drew over 100 students, teachers, family members and former colleagues of Ms. Lilly, who was 53, to Clinton’s auditorium after school. Attendees shared shared songs, prayers and reflections to honor the Bronx resident’s life in an event intended more as a “homecoming celebration” than a somber memorial, in teacher A.J. Thompson’s words.

Colleagues described Ms. Lilly as a strong woman of faith who radiated optimism. They said she was perhaps best described by the Maya Angelou poem “Phenomenal Woman,” one of her favorite works. 

Ms. Thompson and fellow Clinton teacher J. Boyd gave a spirited recitation of the poem, replacing the end of each stanza with their friend’s name: 

“It’s the fire in my eyes, and the flash of my teeth. The swing in my waist, and the joy in my feet. I’m a woman. Phenomenally. Phenomenal woman, that’s Ms. Lilly.”

After Clinton’s band played Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven,” Principal Santiago Taveras shared his memories of Ms. Lilly. As the principal of only a year and a half, Mr. Taveras acknowledged he did not know the math teacher as well as her other colleagues did. 

But he said in that time, he had more one-on-one conversations with Ms. Lilly than he did with most of the school’s teachers, as it was her mission to support the students and discuss ways to achieve that goal. 

“She cared, loved and had the passion to see every single one of our kids succeed,” he said. 

DeWitt Clinton High School, Dorothy Lilly, Santiago Taveras, Memorial, Maya Rajamani
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