Honoring a RVC graduate and an educator

The Rockville Centre Education Foundation will be holding its annual Gala on April 20 at the Madison Theatre at Molloy College.

This year’s gala will honor Doris Kearns Goodwin, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and South Side High School graduate, and Joan F. Waldman, principal of the Floyd B. Watson School. Goodwin will be the Gala Honoree and Waldman will be receiving the Ruth Fins Memorial Award.

Goodwin is the author of five best-selling biographies. Her book “Team of Rivals: the Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln” was the basis for the Steven Spielberg film “Lincoln,” which recently won two Academy Awards.

She also published the best-selling memoir “Wait Till next Year,” her story about growing up in Rockville Centre and her love for her neighborhood, her family and baseball.

Goodwin, a SSHS grad, received her B.A. from Colby College and her Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University. She has been a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and a White House Fellow.

Waldman has devoted her career to teaching Rockville Centre children. She has been a teacher at the Morris, Watson and Covert schools and is currently the principal of the Watson School.

She earned her B.A. in Elementary Education from New York University and went on to earn her Master’s of Science in Special Education from Hofstra University. She is the past the President of the South Shore Administrator’s Association and serves on the Advisory Board to the School of Education at Hofstra.

The Gala is the biggest fundraiser of the year for the Education Foundation, which funds grants for students in the Rockville Centre public schools. This year’s

Gala will be held on April 20 at 6:30 p.m. To purchase tickets, make a donation or place a journal ad, visit www.rvcedfoundation.org.