In Memoriam: Lydia Averell Hurd Smith, 1929-2020

Lydia Smith founder of the Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) program at Simmons University in Boston, died late last year at her home in Lexington, Massachusetts. She was 91 years old.

A native of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Smith graduated from Radcliffe College at Harvard University in 1951 with a bachelor’s degree in English. After graduating Smith accepted a teaching position at St. Mary’s White Mountains School in Bethlehem, New Hampshire, where she taught English, psychology, history, and drama. She then pursued graduate studies at Harvard University, earning a master’s degree and an educational doctorate.

Dr. Smith began teaching at what is now Simmons University on a part-time basis as she raised her family. She taught at the university for 28 before retiring in 1989.

Dr. Smith was the author of three books: Activity and Experience: Sources of English Informational Education , To Understand and to Help: The Life and Work of Susan Isaacs 1885-1948 (Farleigh Dickinson University Press, 1985), and “Open Education” Revisited: Problems in American Educational Reform.