Just some of the few titles Dr. Betty Ellzey holds include English professor, feminist, arts enthusiast, director and mother.
Ellzey was the child of an army officer and spent most of her time growing up between Baltimore and Philadelphia. It was not until her father switched over to civilian that she did not have to move around anymore.
It was in the cultural center of Pittsburgh that Ellzey got her undergraduate degree at Carnegie Mellon and her master’s at the University of Pittsburgh. From there, Ellzey got her doctorate in medieval literature at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
Ellzey said, “It’s a great place because they offer about 20 different medieval languages and everything that you could possibly want in medieval literature.”
Ellzey spent about six months around this time living in England and for years continuously traveled there.
In 1989, Ellzey started work at Shepherd University, which was then Shepherd College. Ellzey feels that this school has come a long way since then.
Ellzey said, “It is more diverse, and there is a lot more opportunity for students.”
Ellzey finds that now students are being exposed more to the wide area that we live in. As an English professor, Ellzey thinks the most important thing is to get students not only interested about literature but also excited about it. One way she has done this is with the Rude Mechanicals, the medieval and renaissance theater troupe on campus. It is a way for students to better understand Shakespeare by being viscerally involved.
Ellzey thinks that the English department is wonderful, and the response seems to be the same if you ask the department about her.
Dr. Heidi Hanrahan, who has known Ellzey for six years, said, “She expects her students to work hard, and she is tough and fair.”
Tough may be the key word, which may explain why some students try to avoid her classes.
Hanrahan said, “She also really seems to inspire them to do great work. I always say that I aspire to be more like her in my own teaching.”
Hanrahan is not the only professor who wishes to be more like Ellzey. Dr. Carrie Messenger feels the same way.
Messenger said, “I would describe her as my hero.”
Messenger is also a mother and seems to truly look up to Ellzey for that, as well.
“Because Dr. Ellzey brought up her daughter in Shepherdstown,” said Messenger, “she’s been great for giving me advice about having kids in the area, and since I live in town, too, I’ve been lucky enough to see her outside of work as well.”
While being a full-time professor at Shepherd, Ellzey has also raised a daughter, who is now a student here at Shepherd University. Ellzey mentioned that, as a single parent, she had certain students who were interested in helping with childcare live with her off campus when her daughter was younger. Ellzey feels that her daughter was always immersed into the Shepherd lifestyle.
Cathy Ellzey, her daughter, said, “Growing up, I had all of these older friends. It was great. They all had to be nice to me because of my mom. They were like paid friends.”
Cathy believes that it helped her mature much faster than some other students get to. Cathy feels that it was hard being adopted by a single parent. She admitted part of the difficulty was that she never had another parent to go to if she was ever on difficult terms with her mother.
“Every year for Christmas, I used to ask for a dad,” said Cathy.
Cathy loves her mother and would not know what life would be like without her. She appreciates her upbringing. She feels that she has kept her mother young in many aspects.
Cathy said, “She’s 65 but acts like she’s 20.”
She stated that Ellzey is keeping up with current slang and trying to hip-hop dance. However, Cathy says that she has not had any effect on her mother’s musical taste.
Cathy said, “She gets really annoyed when I try to change the radio. She likes to listen to the news, NPR and classical music.”
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