Elizabeth Ervin Petersen

Betsy Ervin Petersen was born in San Francisco in 1942. She graduated from Burlingame High School in 1959 and cum laude from Harvard University in 1963, where she met Jim Petersen, her husband of 54 years.

She worked as a reporter for the Boston Globe and later, after moving to New Orleans, as a features writer for The Times-Picayune. She left reporting to raise her sons, William and Tom, but continued writing, publishing a memoir, Dancing With Daddy, in 1991.

While her children were young, she discovered a natural talent for teaching that would shape the rest of her life. In 1990, she began teaching English at Metairie Park Country Day School while earning a master’s degree at UNO. Over the next 29 years, she became a vital part of the community, serving as chair of the English department, and inspiring countless students and colleagues. Betsy’s enthusiasm, humor, and genuine passion for ideas made it easy to get excited about whatever she taught, from literature to writing to art history. She found her students and colleagues equally inspiring and continued learning from them right up to her very last days.

Betsy loved to read; at any given time, there were six or seven open books around the house that she was in the middle of. She read everything: literature, history, poetry, and especially young adult novels; and her frequent trips to the public library earned her a seat on their advisory board.

She had a deep moral sense and confronted injustice with determined frankness. She was impatient with the status quo, skeptical of authority, and she didn’t mind ruffling feathers. She had a profound belief in the transformative power of ideas, and above all, that learning could be joyous and freeing.

She was fiercely loyal to her family and lovingly remembered their camping trips and Halloween costumes and school plays and reading them to sleep. Betsy faced the end of her life with the same frankness with which she lived the rest of it, comfortable in the not-knowing.

Betsy passed away at home on Sunday, with her family and her favorite books around her. She is survived by her husband Jim, her sons William and Tom, her sister-in-law, Weese Petersen, her nieces and nephews, and her Country Day family. She will be dearly missed.

A memorial service followed by a potluck dinner will be held on Friday, October 4th, at 5:30 p.m. on the Founder’s Terrace at Metairie Park Country Day School, 300 Park Rd, Metairie, LA 70005. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Metairie Park Country Day School, The Betsy Petersen Scholar Fund, at the above address, to continue Betsy’s legacy of excellence in teaching.