Kindergarten Teacher

Margaret A. "Peggy" MacKenzie, a longtime Park School educator and administrator, died Saturday of cancer at a daughter's Lutherville home. She was 81. "Peggy was an old hand and an old-timer when I became headmaster in 1976," said F. Parvin Sharpless of Gwynedd, Pa., who was headmaster of Park School until retiring in 1995. "She was a very solid kindergarten teacher who loved the children and was always gentle and never patronizing. She talked to them like they were real people. " The daughter of a building superintendent and a homemaker, Margaret Anne Shelley was born in New York City and raised on Beekman Place in Manhattan.

In April, the first-graders from Daisy Troop 2484, out of West Friendship Elementary School, earned their Orange Learning Petal by studying ways in which they can act responsibly. They underscored the lesson with a trip to Triadelphia Veterinary Clinic in Glenelg, where they met with Dr. Susan Oltman. Oltman discussed the importance of proper diet and exercise for pets, and she showed the girls her surgery room and some X-rays. The troop had a memorable visit, including what student Gracie Hargrove called the best part — getting to see a lizard.

The Baltimore Teachers Union brought a kindergarten teacher to tears Wednesday, surprising her and her 26 students with an extreme makeover of her dilapidated classroom. Abby Haven, a teacher for the past two years at James Mosher Elementary School, was chosen from a pool of 20 teachers who applied to the union and its parent organization, the American Federation of Teachers, for the prize. The program has been in other districts around the country for more than five years, and it's the second time a city school has won. Haven submitted an essay to the union earlier this year, expressing her hope to replace the stained carpet that could trigger her students' allergies and asthma, and to provide her students with shelving so that they could be better organized.

At Germantown Elementary School in Annapolis, students receive physical education once a week. Officially, that is. Unofficially, students are engaging in the same level of activity as their "go-outside-and-play" parents of previous generations. At recess, before classes and after school — and in some cases even during classroom instruction — youngsters are getting workouts by playing traditional games, learning new ones and creating their own spinoff versions. Germantown Elementary is among the first schools in the area to implement a San Diego-based physical education program called SPARK, which stresses to children the importance of physical fitness, then provides grade-level equipment and instruction to back it up. SPARK officials said the program began in 1989 as a result of a study supported by the Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health and San Diego State University.

Doris E. Davies, a retired Baltimore County kindergarten teacher and supervisor, died Oct. 28 of heart failure at the Charlestown retirement community in Catonsville. She was 96. Mrs. Davies also taught for years in Baltimore City and "loved young children," said her son, David Davies of Dallas. Born Doris Elaine Pramschufer in Baltimore on May 14, 1916, she grew up on Calumet Avenue in Frankford and graduated from Eastern High School in 1933. She earned a certificate in primary education from the Maryland State Teachers College at Towson in 1936.

A Frederick County grand jury has indicted a former kindergarten teacher on charges of sexually abusing a child at school. State's Attorney J. Charles Smith acknowledged the indictment Wednesday of Matthew Berresford, 31, of East Berlin, Pa. Berresford couldn't be reached immediately for comment. He has no phone listing, and no defense attorney is listed in court records. Frederick County Public Schools spokeswoman Marita Loose says Berresford worked at North Frederick Elementary School.

Ruth R. Nutzel, a retired church kindergarten teacher, died of a stroke Jan. 29 at Augsburg Lutheran Home. The former Catonsville resident was 88. Born Ruth Ressmeyer in Orange, N.J., she moved to Baltimore as a child when her father became pastor of Emmanuel Lutheran Church, then on Edmondson Ave. She was a 1934 graduate of Western High School, where she was the school's tennis champion and also held city tennis honors. She earned a bachelor's degree in education from Valparaiso University in Indiana.

Sister Barbara Tucker, who taught kindergarten in an Arbutus parochial school, died of a stroke Jan. 30 at Holy Redeemer Hospital in Huntingdon Valley, Pa. She was 66. Born in Philadelphia, she entered her Roman Catholic religious order, Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart, in 1958 in Elkins Park, Pa. She earned a bachelor's degree in education from D'Youville College in Buffalo, N.Y., and a master's degree in early childhood education from the University of...

Charlotte Harrison Perkins, a former kindergarten teacher and homemaker, died of complications of a broken hip Saturday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. She was 99. She was born and raised Charlotte Harrison on Gilmor Street in West Baltimore, and graduated in 1920 from Western High School. She earned her bachelor's degree in education from what is now Towson University. For the next 20 years, she taught kindergarten at Roland Park Elementary School. In 1941, she married Eben F. Perkins III, a Baltimore attorney who died in 1981.

Describing herself as a community artist who makes art for social justice seems fitting for 29-year-old Ashley Minner, who not only works in various mediums but also consults, writes grants, teaches, speaks and serves on boards for several arts organizations and projects. This stems from her growing up in the Lumbee Native American community, where Minner said she learned to "help out and give back whenever possible. " One way she does this is by facilitating an after-school art program for Native American girls.

I grew up in Baltimore reading The Sun, The Evening Sun and The News American initially for comics then on to sports and finally the actual "news. " I remember my English teacher at City College, Mr. Rosskopf, teaching us about H.L. Mencken and the heyday of journalism in America. I wake up Wednesday morning in Afghanistan to find the legacy of that time in shambles. The Baltimore Sun has became a joke when a headline that read "College Park shooter identified as Morgan State University graduate" (Feb.

Margaret A. "Peggy" MacKenzie, a longtime Park School educator and administrator, died Saturday of cancer at a daughter's Lutherville home. She was 81. "Peggy was an old hand and an old-timer when I became headmaster in 1976," said F. Parvin Sharpless of Gwynedd, Pa., who was headmaster of Park School until retiring in 1995. "She was a very solid kindergarten teacher who loved the children and was always gentle and never patronizing. She talked to them like they were real people. " The daughter of a building superintendent and a homemaker, Margaret Anne Shelley was born in New York City and raised on Beekman Place in Manhattan.

Doris E. Davies, a retired Baltimore County kindergarten teacher and supervisor, died Oct. 28 of heart failure at the Charlestown retirement community in Catonsville. She was 96. Mrs. Davies also taught for years in Baltimore City and "loved young children," said her son, David Davies of Dallas. Born Doris Elaine Pramschufer in Baltimore on May 14, 1916, she grew up on Calumet Avenue in Frankford and graduated from Eastern High School in 1933. She earned a certificate in primary education from the Maryland State Teachers College at Towson in 1936.

A year of advocacy was punctuated with celebration Wednesday morning, June 6, as construction of a 200-seat addition to Stoneleigh Elementary School began with a ceremonial groundbreaking. "Less than a year ago, we were saying, 'What are we going to do?' " said Juliet Fisher, a member of the advocacy group, Stoneleigh United. "'How are we going to get something done?' And a year later, here we are. " While those who were responsible for securing the funds - County Executive Kevin Kamenetz, Superintendent Joe Hairston, Dels.

Eleanor Saulsbury's entry into teaching did not bode well for a long, successful career. When she graduated from what is now Coppin State University in 1968, she had asked to be placed at Norwood Elementary in Baltimore County because it was close to her family's home in Edgemere. She was naive, she said, not to think that the fact that she was an African-American might be an issue in an all-white school during a year when riots had left blocks in Baltimore burned and looted. Right away, a parent demanded that her child be taken out of Saulsbury's classroom.

The Baltimore Teachers Union brought a kindergarten teacher to tears Wednesday, surprising her and her 26 students with an extreme makeover of her dilapidated classroom. Abby Haven, a teacher for the past two years at James Mosher Elementary School, was chosen from a pool of 20 teachers who applied to the union and its parent organization, the American Federation of Teachers, for the prize. The program has been in other districts around the country for more than five years, and it's the second time a city school has won. Haven submitted an essay to the union earlier this year, expressing her hope to replace the stained carpet that could trigger her students' allergies and asthma, and to provide her students with shelving so that they could be better organized.

The lawyer for a former Frederick kindergarten teacher says his client is innocent of charges he sexually abused a student last school year. Attorney Thomas Pavlinic said Thursday that 31-year-old Matthew Berresford of East Berlin, Pa., steadfastly denies the allegations. Assistant Frederick County State's Attorney Tammy Leache says Berresford was accused of molesting a 5-year-old boy. Frederick County public schools spokeswoman Marita Loose said Berresford took a paid leave of absence from North Frederick Elementary School in July after the student's parents reported inappropriate behavior.