Steven Lewie is the Lead Maintainer for East Hartford Public Schools who works with his team to keep the district’s buildings and campuses clean, operational and safe. Whether he's assigning crews to take care of problems or fixing one himself, he stays calm and prioritizes tasks to ensure it all gets done.
“He’s a great communicator,” said Dan Ford, Associate Director of Facilities at East Hartford Public Schools. “Even though, whenever people call us, most of the time it's not because their day's going good. It's because their day's going bad. They need something fixed. They need something delivered. They're wondering where this is, they're wondering about that. He’s very calm, very cool, and courteous, always. And then goes and gets it done.”
One of Lewie’s main tasks is to manage the facilities work order software called AkitaBox. He looks through requests from all district buildings to assign maintenance crews and fulfill all requests.
“A lot of things are time sensitive, and there can be safety issues. Or they can just be event setups, a lot of repair work. So, Steve is the one that's really at the head of that,” explained Ford.
Lewie has worked for East Hartford Public Schools for more than two decades, so he’s also the “senior guy on the crew.” Ford says Lewie will show his team how to do repairs, how to work with the department’s equipment, and will do snow plow training each year. On top of all that, he still does repairs himself.
Ford said, “He has to balance the time that he needs on the computer, getting the crews set up, and also doing all the work that he needs to do. He’s still a pivotal part of the maintenance repair work.”
Learn more about Steve Lewie in the Q&A below.
How long have you worked for East Hartford Public Schools?
Lewie: I've been here pretty much forever. It's been 25 years. I started November 1, 2000. This is what I do. I've been here from day one, not fresh out of high school, but almost. This is my work experience, and I love it.
I started working nights as a custodian at the high school, transferred to O'Connell. And then a maintainer position opened up, and I put in for that, and I've been doing that for 23 years.
What does it mean to be the maintainer?
Lewie: We deal with almost every aspect of East Hartford Public Schools. That could be transportation of equipment, special needs equipment. It could be repairs of the building. It can be plowing. It can be event setup. We deliver mulch, we apply mulch, we do the beautification of the front of the buildings. Sheetrock repairs, door hardware falls under us. We try to make sure the buildings are always secure.
Every day is different. We come in in the morning and we have our agenda, and our agenda changes frequently, and we just roll with it.
How do you manage all of the requests from the different district buildings?
Lewie: Our work order system, our AkitaBox system, that’s pretty much how I start my day. I check that. We have a schedule of what we're trying to do, and every day something will typically come up and we have to adjust on the fly. But yeah, I set up our work for us. It comes in to me, and I try to prioritize on a safety basis and then necessity after that. We just kind of roll with the punches here.
How do you personally juggle all of the work of assigning crews, ensuring all requests are fulfilled, and doing maintenance work yourself?
Lewie: I think just the ability that I kind of don't stress too much. I just kind of can roll with things, like if something comes across, it might be a little annoying, but guess what? We just have to deal with it and move through it. I have a great team. Between my guys, management, everybody works together, so it makes it much easier in that sense.
After 25 years here, what keeps you motivated and happy to come to work each day?
Lewie: I like my job. I have, again, a great team, so it makes it easy when you get along with the guys you work with. Management is great with us. And the fact that we do something different every day, I mean, there's no monotony to this job. It's something different every single day.