Paulina Hewelke

Career

Hewelke began her career at the government gymnasium in Pułtusk. In 1883, after Aleksandr Apuchtin began the Russification policies, which prohibited Polish students from speaking their language and studying their culture. He began a series of purges to rid schools of Polish teachers and having little concern for students' education, implemented policies to indoctrinate pupils into Russian culture.

Apuchtin demanded that each school have an Orthodox chapel, forbade outside organizations in schools, and, among other policies, implemented military drills and exercises in memorization, which Mikołaj Kariejew, a lecturer at the University of Warsaw, stated discouraged students from learning and made them resentful. In 1883, when University of Warsaw student Yevgeny Zhukovich slapped Apuchtin, causing student uprisings in support of Zhukovich's action, Hewelke quit her job and took her mother and brother to Warsaw.

Hewelke worked in private schools, simultaneously organizing clandestine courses in her apartment for women to study science. Later she began working at the boarding school run by Izabela Smolikowska and in 1896 she bought the school, changing it from a six-term school to an eight year program. The school was located at 122 Marszałkowska Street and occupied the ground floor of the building. The boarding dormitory was located on the third floor.

Most of the students were from upper and middle-class families, who were part of the intellectual Warsaw enclave. Some pupils were daughters of landowners from Lithuania and Ukraine and others were from less privileged backgrounds. Hewelke based the fees she charged on ability to pay and often reduced or waived tuition entirely for her poorer students. She organized secret courses on Polish culture and participated in creating lectures for the Flying University. Establishing practical exercises, the created a chemical and physical laboratory for her students. Recognizing the need for leisure, she also organized student summer holidays and supported scouting, which had recently emerged in Warsaw.

In 1905, Hewelke hired Zofia Cieszewska, an education women's rights activist, to run the dormitory and teach junior mathematics classes. That year, when the Narodowego Stowarzyszenie Nauczycielstwa Polskiego (National Association of Polish Teachers) was founded, Hewelke, along with Emilian Konopczyński and Marcin Szkopowski were on the inaugural board, chaired by Mieczysław Brzeziński. Among her students were writer Maria Dąbrowska; Maria Grzegorzewska, who initiated special education in Poland; and children's author, Maria Kownacka, among many others. After the Second Polish Republic was established, Hewelke brought in distinguished university professors like biologist Kazimierz Czerwiński, botanist Wacław Jezierski, geologist Stanisław Karczewski, sociologist Ludwik Krzywicki, physicist Tadeusz Miłobędzki, chemist Stefan Mycho, and mathematician Lucjan Zarzecki, among others. Hewelke earned the reputation of running "one of the best women's schools in Warsaw" and was active in the Kole Przełożonych Szkół (Circle of School Superiors) of the Warsaw school system.

Later life, death, and legacy

In 1919, due to failing health, Hewelke sold her school to the government. Former students stepped in to help her, as she became impoverished from an inability to work. She died on 28 January 1924 in Warsaw and was buried in the Evangelical-Augsburg Cemetery, Warsaw.

When the government purchased Hewelke's school, they renamed the facility the Klementyna Hoffmanowa Lyceum and Secondary School IX, and it remained on Marszałkowska Street until it was partially destroyed in the Warsaw Uprising during 1944. In 1961, it was relocated to the site of the former Warsaw Pomological Garden bordered by Nowogrodzka, Emilii Plater, Wspólna, and Tytusa Chałubińskiego Streets of Warsaw.