Dorothy Goodman, 97; founded school

Dorothy Goodman, who cofounded the Washington International School in 1966 to foster what she called the ‘‘Wilsonian dream’’ of world peace, in part by disintegrating national barriers through education, died July 23 at her home in the District. She was 97.

The cause was congestive heart failure, said her son Matthew Goodman.

A native Minnesotan who bristled at the provincial world in which she had grown up, Dr. Goodman left for postwar Europe after college at Bryn Mawr to work with refugee and relief organizations. She trained in England as a historian on a Fulbright scholarship before settling in the Washington area in 1956 with her husband, a British-born World Bank official.

Their social life centered on the international community in Washington, while her professional life starting in the late 1950s focused on the classroom. She taught history at Howard and American universities and grew convinced that American public schools were failing to teach essential language skills and prepare children for college and the world beyond. As a young woman, she had seen the consequences of such shortcomings in a dangerous world, writing of her generation, ‘‘Upon us lies the responsibility of winning the war and winning the peace.’’

With the help of World Bank wives and Bryn Mawr alumni with teaching experience, Dr. Goodman opened what she called the Little Language Class in the basement of her home in D.C.’s Cleveland Park neighborhood, initially with three 4-yearold pupils. Enrollment reached 250 students by the early 1970s and more than double that by the end of the decade, with children representing more than 75 countries. ‘‘Our main thrust,’’ she later told The Washington Post, ‘‘is that education should not be parochial. In every way, we try to be a world school.’’

Dr. Goodman oversaw the school’s acceptance into the elite International Baccalaureate program.

Despite Dr. Goodman’s success in getting WIS well underway, the board forced her aside as head of school in 1983. She stayed to work on fund-raising and curriculum.

Dorothy Bruchholz, the daughter of a banker and a homemaker, was born in Minneapolis on Jan. 15, 1926, and graduated in 1942 from Miss Harris’ Florida School for girls in Miami and in 1946 from Bryn Mawr College.

In 1953, she married Raymond J. Goodman. In addition to her son, of Washington, survivors include three other children, Jeremy Goodman of Princeton, N.J., Harriet Goodman of London and Sophia Goodman of Bloomington, Ind.; two sisters; nine grandchildren; and a great-granddaughter.