A trip to her ancestral home of Poland was one of the highlights of Mary Elaine Lozosky’s travels across the globe. She loved to travel, visiting 33 countries in 32 years. But regardless of the continent to which her travels would take her, she always returned to the little coal patch town in Washington County, which was her lifelong home, Daisytown, Pennsylvania.
She used her creative and research skills to educate others about the history of her beloved Daisytown through her master’s thesis, “Assimilation of the Polish, Slovakian, and Hungarian ethnic groups of Daisytown, Pennsylvania,” as well as two publications, Daisy of a Town, and Daisies, Dignity and Daily Life. Mary Elaine also authored the “History of St. Mary’s Daisytown” in service to her church and her Roman Catholic faith.
Although she had no children of her own, Mary Elaine recognized the potential of youth and understood the value of educating and nurturing our community’s future leaders.
During her 38-year tenure teaching social studies at Burgettstown High School, she positively influenced generations of students, imparting lessons in citizenship and democracy. She also led an active Student Council as faculty advisor. As a meaningful real-life lesson in civic engagement, Mary Elaine encouraged the Student Council members in 1999 to initiate a scholarship fund at the Community Foundation to provide scholarships to future student leaders of Burgettstown High School. She guided the students as they conducted various activities to secure the financial resources to initiate the fund, including a letter writing campaign to local individuals, businesses and Burgettstown alumni. Annually, the scholarship fund has provided a financial award in conjunction with the annual presentation of the Distinguished Service Award to a Burgettstown High School graduating senior.
But Mary Elaine’s educational endeavors did not cease at her retirement from Burgettstown School District. After retiring from the district, she dedicated another nine years to teaching older adults at the Center in the Woods, a charitable nonprofit in California, PA, whose mission is to provide the highest quality of life for older adults. As Education Coordinator for the Center’s Expanding Horizons program, Mary Elaine taught and coordinated diverse educational opportunities for seniors including fiddle playing, Spanish, Slovakian customs, yoga, storm chasing, and Pysanky. It was through a painting course at the Center that Mary Elaine learned to paint, becoming a prolific and award-winning artist in her own right.
During her lifetime, Mary Elaine positively impacted thousands of students of varied backgrounds and ages. But she reserved her most personal and profound lessons for the three young people whom she cherished most, her niece Rachel Lozosky and nephews Jonathan Lozosky and Jordan Lozosky.
Rachel is grateful for those lessons. She remarked, “Through her dedication to her calling as a social studies teacher and Student Council sponsor, our aunt modeled to her niece and nephews the vital importance of education, integrity and civic engagement. She was also a constant presence in our lives, cheering us on loudly and proudly in every academic and extracurricular endeavor. But life with our aunt was not all business. Some of our best memories come from special Christmas shopping trips, debating the comparative merits of the ‘Twilight’ and ‘Hunger Games’ franchises, receiving more baseball cards than any kid has a right to expect, and attending the midnight premiere of the 1989 ‘Batman’ movie in special winged logo T shirts gifted to us for the occasion. Our aunt was one of a kind. She is deeply missed.”
To honor Mary Elaine for her many years serving as the Student Council advisor, the Distinguished Service Award of Burgettstown High School was renamed to the Mary Elaine Lozosky Distinguished Service Award shortly before she passed in May 2024.
As her final lesson in civic engagement, Mary Elaine provided for a testamentary gift to the Community Foundation for the scholarship fund. Her leadership gift, which will quadruple the annual award presented from the fund, is a testament to her generosity and belief in the potential of our youth as tomorrow’s leaders.