A “true pioneer” in Bermuda’s school system, and a principal to generations of Bermudian students, Charlotte Ming, has died at the age of 68.

Dr Ming, the wife of renowned Bermudian chef Fred Ming, passed suddenly from cancer on Thursday. The couple lived together at My Lord’s Bay Lane in Hamilton Parish.

Her brother, former Chief Education Officer Dean Furbert, recalled her 40 year career and described her as “not only my sister, but a colleague in education”.

“Charlotte was like me: we inherited an affinity for the helping professions,” he said. “We grew up in the Cottage Hill area of Bailey’s Bay with a passion to help others develop themselves, with a view to making Bermuda a better place.”

Taking the helm at Clearwater Middle School in 1994, Dr Ming served there with notable dedication until her retirement at the end of 2004.

A driven educator known for her keen memory of the names and details of her students, Dr Ming did not mince words when it came to the difficulties of the job.

“Teaching is stressful and being a principal is even more stressful,” Dr Ming told this newspaper in 2005.

“There is a lot of work to do. I would never have reached this point without my belief in God. If I didn’t believe in God I would have been finished a long time ago. I have just kept on striving.”

With three children of her own — Tamara Adderley, and Robert and Shawn Ming — Dr Ming spoke often of the important role played by parents, especially in a culture where distractions rose year after year.

In the same interview, she also remembered teaching as a calling from early in life.

“I have wanted to be a teacher ever since I was a little child,” she said. “My mother use to say that I would line the neighbourhood children up and practice-teach on them.”

Although she called herself “in many cases a mother to my students”, Dr Ming didn’t hesitate to describe her style as “very strict” — acknowledging children’s innate needs for structure and consistency.

“If you don’t have any rules, then everything falls apart,” she said.

If education was a family career, Clearwater Middle School was something of a family institution: Dr Ming’s mother, Gladys Furbert, worked there; her brother Francis was schooled there, while her brother Dean taught science at the school.

Prior to Clearwater, Dr Ming had worked for ten years as a principal at Harrington Sound Primary School, and she subsequently taught teachers at the Bermuda College.

But it was the introduction of the middle school concept, which Dr Ming oversaw at Clearwater — formerly St George’s Secondary — where she made her mark, recalled deputy principal Derek Tully.

“Dr Ming was a true pioneer in the establishment of middle schools in Bermuda — the greatest single change in the structure of education on this Island in more than 30 years,” Dr Tully told The Royal Gazette.

“Dr Ming threw herself in to the task of this restructuring like the leader she was: committed, passionate, and with dedication to the achievement of the children placed in her charge.”

Dr Tully recalled his colleague rising eagerly to the challenge of the middle school level, formally adopted throughout the Island’s public school system in September, 1996.

“Middle schools are like no other segment of education,” he said. “They consist of teams of teachers who integrate all the subjects the children are taught: maths is integrated with science, which often relates to art and technology. Middle schools teach the whole child, so that they children see the connection between the subjects they are taught.”

Dr Ming took a keen interest in the individual learning styles of children, in particular the difference in how boys and girls learned, and “understood the importance of music and drama in the middle school curriculum”, Dr Tully said.

“She helped us establish our Middle School Orchestra with the assistance of the Menuhin Foundation. That same orchestra, which consisted of students from every single middle school on the Island, performed to great acclaim locally and was invited to perform at the Middle School Conference held in Atlanta in 2004,” Dr Tully said.

“Her passing is a great loss to the education system in Bermuda. We shall all miss her energy, compassion and dedication to her children.”

Getting to grips with the new school system also meant a six-year doctoral programme at New York’s St John’s University, which Dr Ming began in 1998 and completed in 2004, along with Dr Tully and seven other colleagues.

One of them, Melvyn Bassett, hailed her as “a beautiful person, full of life — a great colleague and a very good friend”.

“We served as middle school principals during the same period and had a great friendship,” Dr Bassett said.

“She took her job seriously, and the children loved her. Dr Ming was very well respected by staff and always looked to improve herself so that she could better serve the students of the community. We have all been saddened by the news.”

According to Dr Ming’s brother, her memorial service will be held on Sunday of next week, at the First Church of God on North Shore.