On naming Madison's new primary school

It is apparently still possible to send communications on the naming of Madison's new primary school to comments@madison.k12.wi.us. Here is a copy of my contribution:


Thank you for this opportunity to add my voice to those supporting naming our new primary school in memory of Jeff Erlanger.

When the naming issue first emerged a couple of years back, I was one of those who suggested Howard Temin's name. I have the greatest admiration and respect for Prof. Temin, and hope that there will emerge a suitable opportunity to honor him within the Madison School System. If and when consideration is given to naming Madison high schools for individuals, or naming a school with a magnet-type math/science/health orientation, I think his name belongs at the very top of the list. He was a world renown scientist, a dedicated educator at all levels, a great humanitarian, and a wonderful human being that all might seek to emulate. The level of his transcendent scientific achievements might, however, seem a bit distant and beyond reach for some primary school students.

I cannot imagine a more accessible and worthy model for primary school students than Jeff Erlanger. I knew Jeff (and know his family) well, and worked with Jeff on a couple of small projects over the past two decades. What a truly amazing individual. Only at his funeral, however, did I come to realize how many people Jeff had touched, and in what profound ways. Jeff's story is inspiring in a way that touches us all, and is readily understandable to primary school students. My understanding is that he was the first individual with his level of physical disability to be mainstreamed through the Madison public schools. With his resolute, hopeful and optimistic disposition and commitment to live his own life to the full, and to bring and make meaning (and, in a word of the moment, change) through efforts on behalf of others, he set a model for all of us of what a single person can accomplish in this world--a model likely to be especially meaningful to primary school students.

Having listened to several of Jeff's assistants talk about the impact Jeff had on their lives, I am struck by the ways in which Jeff's life turns around our usual narratives of dependency, and enriches our concepts of human interconnection and the ways in which individuals bring meaning into one another's lives.

One final point: the available documentation of Jeff's life, including videos with Mr. Rogers, provide a living legacy that will be pedagogically meaningful for future generations of students who attend this school, and others in the Madison district. It will continue to signify something, beyond a name on the wall, for students who can come to realize what it means, in very personal terms, to attend the Jeff Erlanger School. Jeff will continue to touch and inspire students, much as he did through his all too brief life, lived to the fullest.

Thank you again for this opportunity to contribute to your deliberations....

Remembering Jeff Erlanger

The Capital Times (Editorial):

We would be remiss if we did not pause to pay tribute to a regular contributor to these pages on his passing. Jeff Erlanger, whom readers of the letters to the editor will know as a serial opinionator, has died at age 36.

That is dramatically too young. But Erlanger achieved more in his third of a century than some do in a whole one.

A quadriplegic, Erlanger was one of Madison's most important and successful activists on issues of concern to our city's physically challenged citizens.

A member of the Governor's Committee for People With Disabilities and the city's Commission on People With Disabilities, Erlanger was an essential player in organizing the city's first summit on housing for the disabled.

Erlanger's broad, optimistic vision made him much more than a disability rights activist. He integrated so many values into a whole that made him an ideal activist.

Erlanger also impressed voters, many of whom cast their ballots for him in a spirited City Council race. Running in a campus-area district, the man who had spent a lifetime in a wheelchair promised that, if elected, he would be 'Standing Up for Students.'

That was Jeff Erlanger: witty, self-deprecating, creative and engaged.

He will not be replaced on these pages or in the civic life of the community. If we are lucky, however, he will be emulated.

One anonymous contributor to the Sound Off column suggests renaming Madison's new West Side School in Jeff's honor and memory. What a wonderful and fitting suggestion!

The Capital Times
Monday, June 18, 2007
"Our Readers Sound Off" (Call-in comments from readers)

"Regarding the naming of the new school, I propose a new name for consideration: Jeff Erlanger. I've been captivated by the words written in praise of this young man, a lifetime Madisonian. As a quadriplegic, he had every reason to feel he was a victim of Mother Nature. He said he would not be defined by his condition. He lived his life being all that he could be. 'I shall overcome' was his attitude. What a role model for schoolchildren."

Our neighborhood loses a friend...

Be more Tuned In:
This includes a link to a video of Jeff Erlanger with Mister Rogers.
How many of us will come close to matching what Jeff accomplished in his all-to-brief life?
His funeral was an incredibly moving testament to a life well and fully lived.
May his family be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

To Debbie Friedman

Thank you.

Jeffrey Erlanger

MADISON - Jeffrey Clay Erlanger, age 36, died Sunday, June 10, 2007, from pulmonary complications, surrounded by his family. Jeff grew up in Madison and graduated from Memorial High School and Edgewood College. He lived his life with boundless enthusiasm, taking advantage of every opportunity to make a friend or make a difference. A quadriplegic since infancy, he was never defined by his disability, and his optimism and accomplishments inspired us to see possibilities instead of obstacles. Jeff was a tireless advocate for disability rights; for example, he played a pivotal role in bringing accessible taxi service to Madison and in fostering the Mayor's recent conference on accessible housing. He was as articulate and passionate in debating current events as he was in debating the likelihood of the Brewers or Cubs making it to the World Series. He worked with children as a camp counselor and religious school teacher, and he often visited classrooms (accompanied by his loyal service dog) to discuss living with a disability. He touched many lives with his candid appearance on PBS's "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood" at age 10 and through his lifelong friendship with Fred Rogers. His generous spirit, fabulous laugh and incredible passion will live on forever in the lives he has affected. - Jeff served as an intern for U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold and U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin. He served on many City of Madison committees, including the Economic Development Commission, the Commission on People with Disabilities (where he was a former chair), and the Civil Rights Department Ad Hoc Committee. He was chairman of the board of the Community Living Alliance, a major Madison nonprofit. He also served on the board of the Madison Area Community Land Trust, served on the Wisconsin State Rehabilitation Council, previously served on the board of Jewish Social Services, and ran a spirited campaign for City Council in 2002, finishing second in a field of six. - Jeff is survived by his parents, Pam and Howard Erlanger of Madison; his sister, Lisa Erlanger of Seattle; his brother-in-law, Jeffrey Coopersmith; his niece, Emma (whom he adored); and his aunts, uncles and cousins. His family gives special thanks to Dr. William Schwab, Jeff's physician, friend and mentor, who was with him to the end and whose unstinting dedication to the Erlanger family will always be cherished; to Dr. Kenneth Wood, Jeff's attending physician for much of the three weeks he spent on life support, whose expertise and extraordinary compassion were indispensable to Jeff and the family; and to the nursing staff of the Trauma and Life Support Center at University Hospitals, Madison. - The funeral will be held on Thursday, June 14, 2007, at TEMPLE BETH EL, 2702 Arbor Drive (behind Knickerbocker Square on Monroe Street). The service will begin promptly at 9:45a.m.; please arrive early to allow time for parking, which may be congested. - In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations to the Olin Sang Ruby Summer Camp, 555 Skokie Blvd., Northbrook, IL 60062, for the Jeffrey Erlanger Memorial Fund, which will be used to enhance the summer camp experience of children with special needs. Cress Funeral and Cremation Service 3610 Speedway Road (608) 238-3434 www.cressfuneralservice.com (Time stamp artificial)

Erlanger was a real treasure

The Capital Times:
By Doug Moe

I REMEMBER the first time I spoke with Jeff Erlanger, he had been doing a number of national media interviews and was a bit miffed because so many of them played up the fact that he was a quadriplegic.

Erlanger, who died here Sunday at age 36, told me: 'I never considered it part of the story.'

It was, in any case, quite a story that Jeff was involved with in February 2000. ABC's 'Good Morning America' wanted it. So did a radio station in Iceland. So did I.

This was before Jeff and I became friendly and he asked me to speak to a class he was teaching, before I knew about his close relationship with TV's Fred Rogers or the many civic causes Jeff devoted himself to in Madison. I just knew a good story when I heard one and Erlanger had a stunner. ...

(Time stamp artificial)

Remembering Jeff Erlanger (III)

Isthmus | The Daily Page: By Vikki Kratz

I could not tell you what Jeff Erlanger's day job was, or even if he had one. I could not tell you much about his family, or what he liked to do for fun.

But I did know one side of Jeff, and that was the man who cared deeply about making the city of Madison a fair place for everyone. He served on several city committees, including the Commission on People with Disabilities and the Economic Development Commission.

I knew Jeff as the architect of the city's first summit on housing for the disabled. It was an idea he had promoted for more than a year, and he was thrilled when the city finally held the conference at Monona Terrace in April.

All Jeff wanted was for developers to think about people with disabilities when they build houses -- to make sure the doorways are wide enough for wheelchairs, eliminate steps at the entrance, put a bathroom on the first floor. Simple ideas that are, as ever, made more complicated by politics and state laws.

Jeff... focused much of his activism on improving the lives of people with disabilities. But Jeff was the kind of person who immediately dispelled any notion that you might have about treating the disabled with paternalism or pity. He was intelligent, funny and often politically savvy. He was the kind of person who, even if he hadn't been disabled himself, would have been at the table arguing for people's rights anyway.

Remembering Jeff (II)

The Capital Times: By Kristin Czubkowski

In 36 years of life, Jeff Erlanger built a resume that could put many city politicians or political organizers to shame.

Former chairman of Madison's Commission on People With Disabilities, chairman of the board of directors of the Community Living Alliance, member of the city's Economic Development Commission and the Governor's Committee for People With Disabilities, board member of Jewish Social Services and the Madison Area Community Land Trust -- the list goes on.

Add in a run for the City Council and a childhood appearance on 'Mister Rogers' Neighborhood' that led to a speech at the icon's memorial in 2003, and Erlanger did more in his life than most people do with twice the amount of time."...

[Mayor Dave] Cieslewicz said he was friends with Erlanger for many years and will miss him personally as well as professionally.

"He was somebody I relied on for a number of issues," he said.

More importantly, Cieslewicz said Erlanger was well-respected and liked.

"He had a minimum investment in ego," the mayor said. "It was always just about making progress."

Erlanger's death, Cieslewicz said, is a "real significant loss to the city."

Howard Erlanger shared a quote from an award-winning WHA promotion that Jeff was a part of, which aired frequently on national stations and embodied his perspective on life.

"It doesn't matter what I can't do -- what matters is what I can do," Jeff Erlanger says in the promotion. "That's how I try to live my life."

Remembering Jeff (I)

Wisconsin State Journal: By MATTHEW DeFOUR

There was always something 'magical' about Jeff Erlanger.

From his childhood appearance on 'Mister Rogers' Neighborhood' to the night he saved a Boston woman's life over the Internet, strange and wonderful things seemed to happen to him, said his father, Howard Erlanger.

Or rather, Jeff Erlanger was able to make them happen.

The Madison civic activist who sat on a number of commissions representing the disabled died Sunday. He was 36.

The fact that a spinal tumor cost Erlanger the use of his arms and legs as an infant was probably the least remarkable thing about him.

'He never once said, I wish I wasn't disabled,'' Howard Erlanger said. 'That just wasn't something that was an issue.'

Jeff Erlanger's philosophy, summarized in an award-winning ad he filmed in 2002 for Wisconsin Public Television, was: 'It doesn't matter what I can't do -- what matters is what I can do.'...

"One of the reasons I so admired Jeff was he was passionate about our nation on a big-scale level and equally passionate about our community," [Dane County Executive Kathleen] Falk said. "This is a man who devoted so many countless hours to making things better for other people."

For Jeff

Our friend, Jeff Erlanger, passed away last night.

A few words from his family:

As in life, Jeff gave generously at death. Recipients were found for several of his organs and in the midst of this tragedy we are blessed in the knowledge that others will be helped, as he wanted.

We will always remember Jeff as the person who showed us the true meaning of a life well lived.

And inspired so many of us.
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