Sam was nearly 6 and it was time to find him an elementary school – actually, it was way past time.

It was late May, and Sam’s increasingly frantic parents were scrambling. They had tried a few expensive private schools without success. Sam had Attention Deficit Disorder, and going to new places and meeting new people was hard.

The fancy schools liked to claim they took special-needs children. But when Sam went for visits and sat silently or nervously doodled instead of taking part, the schools decided he should be somewhere else.

Then the parents heard about the Children’s School, a relatively new public school just a few blocks from where they lived in the Carroll Gardens section of Brooklyn.

It was – and still is – the only all-inclusion school in the city.That means a handful of special-ed children are put into every class, which has two teachers – one special-ed and one general-ed. Everyone covers the same material.

The parents had their doubts as they walked Sam into the building – an old Catholic school – but then they met the principal, a short, handsome woman who looked like a former nun. Her name was Lorraine Boyhan and, unlike the teachers at the other schools, she talked directly to Sam.

“Sam,” she said, bending over slightly, “let’s go upstairs and see what the kindergarten children are doing.” She then turned around, put her right hand behind her back with her palm toward Sam, moved it a little closer, and waited for him to take it.

His parents were afraid he wouldn’t, but he did, and Sam and Mrs. Boyhan walked up to a third-floor classroom.

When they got there, Mrs. Boyhan, still holding Sam’s hand, introduced him to the teachers, Miss Regan and Miss Virginia.

“Hi, Sam,” said Miss Regan. “We’re making flags out of construction paper. Sit here next to Nevada and she’ll show you what to do.”

To the parents’ amazement, he sat down and started making a flag, even asking Nevada if he was doing it right.

Sam had found the perfect school, and Lorraine Boyhan, a fiftysomething career educator, had worked yet another small miracle.

Now, Mrs. Boyhan, one of the city’s best principals, is leaving the Children’s School, which she helped create in 1992 as a better way to deal with special-ed children than dumping them into classes that were little more than prison prep.

She is getting a well-deserved promotion to instructional superintendent for seven schools with special-ed programs, including the Children’s School, where she will spend her last day as principal on Wednesday.

While she’ll have more input on a system-wide basis, the kids at the Children’s School will lose that loving touch from a woman who believes every child can learn.

“I have such mixed feelings about leaving,” Mrs. Boyhan says, tears welling up in her eyes and her voice catching in her throat.

“It’s tough to go, but the place is ready now. We’ve come from a school that combed the streets looking for students to one with a long waiting list,” she adds. Every year, the school gets about 300 applications for 36 prekindergarten slots.

“It’s sad because I won’t be able to become as involved with the students,” says Mrs. Boyhan, who started out as a private school special-ed teacher 31 years ago and has been in the city system for the last 27 years. “But kids are so endearing; I’m sure I’ll be able to forge some one-on-one relationships.”

The inclusion approach – now used in a handful of schools but only in some of the classes – was a tough sell at first.

“Some parents were skeptical of it,” she says. “They didn’t like the idea of having special-ed kids in the same class as their children who were general-ed. They thought it would slow down the learning process. But most parents have come to accept it.”

They have also come to love Mrs. Boyhan and her willingness to go the extra mile for her students.

Once, a few years ago, a frightened little girl sat on the stairs and refused to go to her class. Mrs. Boyhan sat next to her and spoke quietly. Finally, the girl agreed to go, but only if she could scoot backward, and sitting down. Mrs. Boyhan agreed, and they scooted up to the third floor together, laughing all the way.

“This is home,” she says, crying again. “I’ve seen so many kids come and go. It’s just time to leave, I guess.”