Former Spotswood teacher pens memoir on 50-plus years in education

For more than half a century, Ellen Lewis has dedicated her professional life to education. Lewis recently took her lengthy experience and penned a book titled, "The Wednesday Lady."

An honest mix of reminiscences and reporting, the book is culled from real-life letters and report card comments. While there is a sense of Lewis' fun and love of teaching to the book, some stories are teary and heartbreaking.

"The stories are true," said Lewis, who lived and raised her son in East Brunswick before moving to Monroe a few years ago. "Names have been changed for legal reasons. And it's not all just happy-go-lucky. There's some very sad and very not nice things, too, that I included."

A teacher in Spotswood for 32 years, Lewis initially retired from the classroom and took up a role with Pearson, the testing center. For several years, Lewis traveled for the state Department of Education providing professional development for educators on how to use Pearson's formal assessment tool and use the feedback from the software. During that time, she also administered standardized tests to students throughout the state.

After that stint, Lewis taught Conversational English online to Chinese students. During the COVID pandemic, she was enticed back to the classroom by the DOE and now works for the Educational Services Commission of New Jersey (ESCNJ), based in Piscataway. She finds herself mainly in classrooms at non-public schools.

"That job sounded different − interesting," Lewis said. "So, for five years now, I have been working been traveling to different schools working with students who score from the 39th percentile and below in our standardized tests to try to help these students get back on track. These are students who are struggling because as we all know, COVID was not helpful to our students."

It is at one of these schools that Lewis became "The Wednesday Lady."

Just after COVID restriction eased and Lewis was back teaching in-person, the principal came to her as she was setting up her class. She wanted to speak with Lewis when she was done.

"I was really upset because I worried that I offended somebody," Lewis said. "So, she asked me to sit down, and she put a big smile on her face. She said, 'I have to tell you something.' She said, 'Many people have come to this school, religious people, political people, people from the community who are curious, but no one has received a welcome like you have.' I used to work on Wednesday afternoons my first year there. And the principal said, 'I want you to know that every Wednesday when those kids are eating lunch and they see your car pull up into the parking lot from the window where they're sitting, they all get up from their seats, go over to the window, start clapping and chanting The Wednesday lady is here. The Wednesday lady is here.’”

The book came about from as student as well. Lewis, who taught first grade in Spotswood, was contacted by a former student from her very first class in 1972 who asked if she would be at their 50th class reunion.

"I've been contacted by so many parents and so many students − the process has been very rewarding," she said. "That was one of the reasons why I wanted to get my book out − as a as a recognition of 50 years with that one class. I'm still in touch with the kids and their parents."

Lewis loved working in Spotswood. It had a small-town vibe and she saw generations enter and exit her classroom.

"There's something about a small town. I grew up in a small town," she said. "In Spotswood, I had the mayor. I had the mayor's children. I had the superintendent. I had his wife. The kids there, they grow up, they go to college, they come home, they buy a house two blocks away from the house they grew up in with their parents. I'd have mothers as room mothers and then later they would be grand room mothers. You would see different families combining. So-and-so would marry so-and-so and then I would teach the next generation. I used to get invited to kid's birthday parties and to their houses for lunch when I first started teaching."

"The Wednesday Lady" took Lewis about 14 months to write, she said.

"I had a lot of encouragement," Lewis said. "I belong to different writers' clubs and had a lot of encouragement from my peers in the group. And it was just something I felt I wanted to do. And something that was creative − I like to be creative with different kinds of things. And so this was another creative experience for me."

"The Wednesday Lady," is actually Lewis' second book. She wrote about her family's ancestry for a niece when she got married. After that, the writing bug bit and Lewis took a seminar in writing a memoir. A seminar leader suggested she speak with another professional and that chat spawned what later became "The Wednesday Lady."

"I was figuring out how I was going to approach my vision of what a memoir was," she said. "When we talked, the woman was asking me about my experience with writing, my career, etc. And then she said, 'Tell me what you have written so far in your life.' I said, 'I wrote for my niece for her wedding. I wrote grocery lists, and I wrote report card comments.' And she said, 'Well, there you go. That's your first book.'"

It was an awakening, Lewis said.

"When you are so intensely involved with something, you don't see the whole picture," she said. "It takes you a while and that's what the book helped me see − the whole picture."

Lewis also feels the book is timely because education is undergoing so many changes throughout the country.

"The pendulum is swinging out of control, I think," she said. "I think nobody knows where to turn to for all the answers and people are scurrying around. There's so many things now that teachers have to deal with that I didn't have to deal with. I'm not saying they weren't there, but things were not so intense or vocal. And I speak to young teachers and to be honest, a lot of them have said to me, 'I don't think I'll make it as long as you did.' I think the book really helped me get a grip and understand my part."

Lewis still finds joy in teaching and being "The Wednesday Lady," looking forward to her time with the students every week.

"I've dabbled in and around a lot," she said. "And every day, I learned something new. There's always a student who teaches me something new. And I've made so many great relationships in my classroom teaching and being this traveling troubadour of the classroom. And to hear when I'll be walking down the hall, 'Oh are you the Wednesday lady? Oh, good. I'm so glad.' So as long as I continue to get the joy that I can and feel that I have helped a few children, then it's important for me to keep it up."

Published by Rebel Books Press, Lewis' book is sold in bookstores everywhere in U.S. and across Europe and the United Kingdom as well as online on websites such as Barnes and Noble and Amazon.

email: cmakin@gannettnj.com

Cheryl Makin is an award-winning features and education reporter for MyCentralJersey.com, part of the USA Today Network. Contact: Cmakin@gannettnj.com or @CherylMakin. To get unlimited access, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: Former Spotswood NJ teacher pens memoir on 50-plus years in education