Bachelor S Degree

Robert Kerr Billingslea Jr., a longtime Carroll County educator and school administrator, died of complications from a stroke Tuesday at the Brethren Home Community in New Oxford, Pa. He was 84. Mr. Billingslea, who was born in Westminster, graduated from Westminster High School in 1938 and the Mercersburg Academy preparatory school in Pennsylvania in 1941. His college education at Washington and Lee University was interrupted by World War II. In 1943, he joined the Marine Corps and briefly served in the South Pacific.

Dressed in crisp black caps and gowns, the students chatted as they waited for the start of the Strayer University commencement ceremony yesterday afternoon at the Baltimore Convention Center. For many of them, it would be the first and only time they would meet each other. Studying at satellite campuses in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware, and online, the more than 500 students toiled largely in solitude as they balanced jobs, families and life. They had little chance to get to know each other.

Ten educators were selected as finalists for the Harford County Public School Teacher of the Year award. This year, in addition to holding the title, the winner will receive $10,000 cash, a Dell laptop and a new Toyota Camry to use for one year. The winner also will advance to the statewide competition. The Teacher of the Year will be announced at a banquet scheduled for April 27 at the Bayou Restaurant in Havre de Grace. This year's finalists are: Kerrie L. Bauer: As a student, Bauer loved high school.

Thomas A. Whiles, an artist and former oil company geologist, died of spinal melanoma Wednesday at his Towson home. He was 58. Mr. Whiles was born in San Antonio, Texas, and raised in Midland, Texas. In 1969, he earned a bachelor's degree in music from North Texas State University in Denton. During the 1980s, he earned a bachelor's degree in earth geology, and in the 1990s, a bachelor's degree in mathematics, both from the University of Texas of the Permian Basin in Odessa. In the 1970s, Mr. Whiles began working in the drafting department of Conoco Oil Co., and in the early 1980s took a similar post at Union Texas Petroleum.

Etta R. Lyles, who overcame a troubled upbringing and an abusive marriage to enter college in her 40s and over the course of 15 years earn a bachelor's degree, two master's degrees and a doctorate, died of cancer Thursday at her son's Bel Air home. She was 76. Dr. Lyles worked for the Maryland Department of the Environment, where she established a library, from 1986 until her job was eliminated by budget cuts in 2002. Though in her 70s, she went back to school to become a paralegal and last fall completed an internship in the Maryland attorney general's office.

On Tuesday, Annapolis voters will go to the polls to elect a mayor and eight-member Board of Aldermen. Here are snapshots of the candidates: MAYOR Ellen O. Moyer (D) Age: 69 Professional experience: Retired lobbyist, Maryland State Teachers Association Education: Bachelor's degree, Penn State; master's of education, Goucher College Political/civic experience: Mayor since 2001; alderman representing Eastport, 14 years; served on State Board of Education and Maryland State Racing Commission Web site: www.mayorellenmoyer.

WASHINGTON - New census figures offer dramatic evidence of education's big payback: Income for African-Americans with a four-year college degree has increased so much since the civil rights advances of the 1960s that we have almost closed our historical income gap with four-year, college-educated whites. In 2003, the latest year for which figures are available, blacks with a bachelor's degree had a median income of $36,694, which is almost as high as the $38,667 median income of whites with a bachelor's degree.

The Rev. Olin Preston Moyd, a religious author and longtime pastor at Mount Lebanon Baptist Church, died of bone cancer Sunday at Sinai Hospital. The longtime Ashburton resident was 75. Dr. Moyd was born and raised in Jamestown, S.C., the son of a Baptist minister. He moved to Baltimore when he was in his early 20s and earned his General Education Development diploma while serving in the Army from 1953 to 1955. After being discharged as a corporal, he returned to Baltimore and enrolled at the Cortez W. Peters Business School.

T'Ann E. Froehlich, 89, homemaker, secretary T'Ann Ewing Froehlich, a homemaker who became a student after raising a family and at age 62 earned a bachelor's degree in political science, died of Alzheimer's disease Feb. 10 at an assisted-living facility in Harwich, Mass. The longtime Timonium resident was 89. Born T'Ann Ewing Wilson in Kelowna, British Columbia, and raised in Vancouver, she worked as a secretary for an engineering company after graduating from a business school. During World War II, she moved with her family to Bermuda and was a secretary for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

WOMEN'S BRAINS work differently from those of men - different sizes, different electrical patterns, different test scores. That much we know is true. But that fact, as interesting and complicating to our lives as it might be, appears to have nothing to do with why more women don't have top jobs in academic science. Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers suggested at a conference in Cambridge, Mass., last month that innate intellectual differences between women and men might be one reason why women are less active than men in areas such as math, physics and engineering.