The Etobicoke high school where late Mayor Rob Ford used to coach football for over a decade is closing its doors for good on June 30, a victim of low enrollment.
But Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School is going out big next Saturday with an onsite reunion of about 1,000 alumnus, teachers, administrators and other staff over the last 39 years, from 1978 to 2017. The event will even include a mass by former graduate and ordained priest Damir Stojic who is travelling from Croatia to be there.
“If you’ve ever known anyone from this school, we’re a whole different breed,” said Eva Lerant, the chairperson of the Don Bosco Final Farewell Reunion Committee and a 1987 graduate.
“It’s a family. Not a school. (Like) our patron saint, Don Bosco, we’re based on religion and kindness.”
Rob’s big brother Doug Ford says “it’s a shame” the school is closing for many reasons including its connection to his younger sibling who passed away from cancer in 2014.
“We’re very disappointed,” said Ford. “As much as people don’t realize it, a lot of kids will go to schools for certain programs in high priority neighbourhoods that may not be academic (as in) sport. And through sport - football - Rob brought that school from a no-name school to a nationally recognized school for the football program. It’s not a coincidence as soon as Rob left that school (in 2013), not his choice, it instantly started to go downhill.”
Ford said he’s behind a Rexdale group trying to get the city to buy the school and turn it into a community centre.
Lerant agreed Rob Ford’s involvement with the school’s Don Bosco Eagles football team from 2002-2013 was something to remember fondly.
“His presence at our school was a very positive one,” she said. “The kids loved him. He was a great coach. He donated athletic uniforms and from what we hear from kids that were there at the time, he even paid for school uniforms for kids who couldn’t afford it. He was part of our Bosco community and he was very much loved by the kids that were here.”
Some of the students walked in Ford’s funeral procession and attended his burial.
“I went by his grave site and they have a Don Bosco football jersey one of the players dropped off at the grave site,” recalled Ford. “So, it was there for about three or four months. My mom picked it up and washed it and brought it back to him.”
