A TEACHER who has educated the children of Maldon for 26 years will retire this summer.
Inclusion manager Shelley Clark, 60, of Burnham has had a 39-year career as a teacher and has taught at Maldon Primary School since 1988. She even attended herself, between the ages of five and 11.
Mrs Clark, wife of newly retired BBC Essex presenter Ray Clark, 60, says that she has known four generations of families to have been taught at the school.
She said: "Yes, I'm sad. It's a truly wonderful community school with lovely pupils and staff but now I have a lot more freedom, but it will be hard to stop thinking about teaching after doing it so long.
"I've always really enjoyed working here and I was just very glad to be a part of the school for so long. I know some of the children's great-grandmothers.
"It was so important to me to have a good relationship with the children and I'm always very proud of our children that leave Maldon Primary as good citizens."
One of Mrs Clark's two sons, Jonathan Kitchener, also teaches at the school, which celebrated its 100th birthday in 2012.
A grandmother of four, Mrs Clark had decided to retire after her 60th birthday and will enjoy her retirement with husband Ray, who called time on his radio show just a fortnight ago.
She said: "I decided to retire a year ago and now Ray has ended up beating me to it."
Mrs Clark said that she has a number of ways to fill her time after she formally retires on the last day of term on July 18.
"I will always stay busy. I'm very interested in child psychology and would like to study that," she said.
"I've also been telling stories throughout my teaching career, often about naughty little girls, to the children so maybe, one day, I would like to put them all in a book.
"I've always said that I was one of the naughtiest little girls to go to Maldon primary so it makes sense."
She also plans to take time to travel to Australia and the US where the family have friends.
She said: "We've got the freedom to do what we want now without the restriction of school holidays now so we plan to have a nice holiday in September."
The school will host an afternoon tea for Mrs Clark's retirement on Thursday, July 17, ahead of her last day on July 18.
