50 years of teaching, going strong

In 50 years of teaching at St. Matthew's School in Philadelphia's Mayfair section, Mary Jane McCormick has pretty much done it all:

Taught every grade except kindergarten and fourth; worked with small groups of children needing help with math and reading; overseen the daily pretzel distribution; coordinated annual May processions; and coached basketball, track and field, and volleyball. She's also planned anniversary celebrations for many of her colleagues.

Last night, it was McCormick's turn.

A total of 275 former students, teachers, families and community members squeezed into St. Matthew's parish hall, filled with pink roses, for a dinner and tribute to McCormick's singular devotion to the K-8 Catholic elementary school.

"I am a little bit humbled and honored they are doing all this," said the 67-year-old dynamo most children now call "Miss McCormick" but who was known as "Miss Mary Jane" when she began teaching in 1958, only a few months after graduating from Little Flower Catholic High School in Hunting Park.

"Teaching is just like a part of me," McCormick said. "I started out so young, I just kept it up. I guess I fell in love with this place."

St. Matthew's, on Cottman Avenue, has nearly 1,000 students and is the largest parish elementary school in the five-county Archdiocese of Philadelphia and one of its most heralded. The principal, Sister Kathleen M. Touey, and pastor, Msgr. Charles E. McGroarty, have been honored by the National Catholic Educational Association for their work at the school.

"She's been instrumental in keeping the school as solid as it is," Touey said.

As seventh graders, Maureen Mattern, Kate Hart and Pat Green were on McCormick's first basketball team in 1962.

"She was a great coach," Mattern said at the reception. "We didn't even have a gym then. We used to practice in here."

Hart added: "I was saying on the way over here not only was she our coach but we have known her 50 years. We were all in the fourth grade when she came."

Hundreds of other well-wishers who couldn't attend the dinner sent cards, letters and e-mails that were collected and put into a thick, embossed album that was presented to McCormick.

Last night's festivities began "Miss McCormick Week" at St. Matthew's.

A student talent show is on tap for tonight. A faculty basketball game is scheduled for Wednesday with McCormick, who coached the girls' basketball team for 29 years, perhaps blowing the whistle as referee. After a Mass in her honor Thursday, each grade will serenade her, and she and her family will be the guests at a faculty luncheon.

"She's a great teacher," said Touey, who has been principal at St. Matthew's for a decade. "She's been the one able to carry the torch, going from one generation to the next."

McCormick, who never married, has immersed herself in the lives of her students and St. Matthew's parish, where she serves on the parish council.

"She's never had her own family," Touey said. "St. Matthew has been her family. Every day after school she's here downstairs and helps [students] with their homework."

Fourth-grade teacher Charlotte Novak, who has been McCormick's close friend for 41 years and who drives her to school each day, added: "Whenever there's a project at the school, she's the first to volunteer."

In 1958, McCormick, who had just turned 18, had some summer classes at Hallahan High School under her belt to help prepare her for her first stint of teaching. But she admits she was probably a little nervous that first day when she looked out at the upturned faces of 78 second graders sitting in her classroom. She earned $50 a week.

Most of the children went home for lunch in those days because few mothers worked outside the home. McCormick remembers that on the first day, one little girl stopped by a drugstore on Cottman Avenue on her walk back to school.

"She came back with Mary Jane candy and said, 'This is a present for you,' " McCormick recalled.

Nowadays, she said, it would be much more difficult to teach a class of 78 children. But back then, most children came from large families, knew they were in school to learn, and did not expect as much personal attention as students today, she said.

Marking homework and preparing report cards six times a year were the hard parts, McCormick said.

"You were so busy, and I always had a pencil or a pen in my hand. You didn't have time to do a lot of college work," said McCormick, who ultimately earned a degree in the 1970s from Holy Family College, now Holy Family University.

For the last seven years, McCormick has been working with small groups of students with learning difficulties. This year, she has eight fifth graders and 14 sixth graders who come to her class for help with reading or math. She also has two classroom assistants.

McCormick and Novak will take a two-week vacation along the coast of Ireland this summer to celebrate McCormick's 50-year milestone. But although McCormick will be 68 next month, retirement is not yet part of her plans.

"I say tentatively in two years," McCormick said yesterday. "I think the day I leave is going to be an emotional day. I wanted to enjoy this year."