Substitute Teacher

Margaret B. "Peg" Meckley, a homemaker and a former substitute teacher, died of bladder cancer Nov. 22 at her York, Pa., home. The longtime Timonium resident was 79. Margaret Betts, the daughter of a college professor and a homemaker, was born in Iowa City, Iowa. When she was 8, she moved with her family to State College, Pa., when her father joined the faculty of Pennsylvania State University. She earned a bachelor's degree in 1952 in education from Penn State, and that same year married Robert A. Meckley.

Joshua Parker fell in love in 10th grade, discovering the power of words when his English teacher put a volume of Langston Hughes in his hands. He describes it as a moment so profound that it was like hearing chords of music for the first time. Bright but with a middling interest in school, Parker had suddenly found his passion. He swallowed up books of poetry and scribbled dozens of lines to a girl. "It showed the human condition lyrically," Parker said leaning forward, his hands gripping the sides of a table.

Bernice Gordon, a retired Baltimore elementary school substitute teacher who was active in her church, died Friday of complications from diabetes at Sinai Hospital. The Ashburton resident was 83. Born Bernice Harris in Baltimore and raised on West Lafayette Avenue, she was a 1938 graduate of Douglass High School and studied at what is now Morgan State University. She was a substitute teacher at the old Mildred Monroe Elementary School, at Guilford Avenue and Lanvale Street, for two decades.

Naida B. Scaggs, a longtime Baltimore County elementary school educator, died June 16 of pancreatic cancer at Gilchrist Hospice Care in Towson. She was 65. The daughter of a chemist and a homemaker, Naida Burkholder was born in Baltimore and raised on East 32nd Street. After graduating from Eastern High School in 1963, she earned a bachelor's degree in 1967 in elementary education from what is now Towson University. She later earned a master's degree in education from what is now Loyola University of Maryland.

Marcus Garvey Gillespie, a father of eight who became a substitute teacher at Woodlawn High School after retiring as a carpenter, died of cancer Monday. He was 72.Mr. Gillespie began his career as a forklift operator at Bethlehem Steel, where he worked for 15 years. The longtime Baltimore resident then worked as a carpenter at both the Liberty and Harbor campuses of Baltimore City Community College before retiring in 1993.He is survived by his wife, Kaye Thompson Gillespie; three sons, Marcus G. Gillespie Jr. and Robert Gillespie, both of Delaware, and Rickey Gillespie of North Carolina; and five daughters, Carolyn Gillespie and Rosina Gillespie, both of Baltimore, and Jacqueline Williams, Lenora White and Sylvia Thomas, all of Delaware.

SELMA, Calif. -- Eighth-graders at Abraham Lincoln Middle School had a substitute teacher yesterday on their first day of school: President Clinton.He sat on a desk in front of the classroom, with a U.S. map to his left and a world map to his right, gave his own brief review of U.S. history, and fielded their questions.They weren't exactly the kind of hard-hitting queries usually thrown at him by the White House press corps, but Mr. Clinton treated them with respect.His theme was simple: Education is the key to America's economic future in the 21st century.

Gwen P. Geiger, a retired National Security Agency worker, died of heart failure Sunday at Anne Arundel Medical Center. The Arnold resident was 56. She was born Gwen Patricia Jennings in Plainfield, N.J., and raised in Locust Point and Baltimore Highlands. She graduated from Lansdowne High School in 1967 and earned a paralegal degree from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. In 1967, Mrs. Geiger began working at NSA at Fort Meade and retired as a data flow manager in 1989. She also had been a substitute teacher in Anne Arundel County public schools.

A Pasadena man has filed a $100,000 lawsuit against the Anne Arundel County school system, claiming he was wrongly fired after working 11 days as a substitute teacher last year.Timothy M. Trogdon was hired to teach three history classes at Arundel High School in the fall of 1993 while another teacher was on extended sick leave.In the suit, filed Friday, Mr. Trogdon contends that he was hired as a long-term substitute with the promise of a permanent position if the other teacher did not return, but that he was fired without cause his second week on the job.A Dec. 14, 1993, letter obtained by The Sun indicates that school officials did list reasons for Mr. Trogdon's firing.

A seventh-grader at Patuxent Valley Middle School told school officials Thursday afternoon that a substitute teacher choked him, Howard County school officials said.The boy told the school's vice principal at the end of the day that a male substitute teacher had "touched him inappropriately," said school system spokeswoman Patti Caplan.The student told the administrator that the teacher had put his arms around his neck, but the teacher denied that, Caplan said Friday night. The teacher told school officials that his arms were "not around the neck but more a forearm up against the neck," Caplan said.

The family of a Howard County student has filed a $10 million federal lawsuit against several officials in the school system, alleging that administrators failed to protect the student from bullying that led to his suffering from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Baltimore on Tuesday, alleges that in December 2007, officials at Patapsco Middle School in Ellicott City failed to protect the student's rights to due process and equal protection by not intervening in "serious episodes of student-on-student violence" by a group of five students.

Sidney Carton, a popular city high school math teacher who made sure his students understood the difference between the Pythagorean theorem, pi r squared, a hypotenuse and other math concepts before leaving his classroom, died Aug. 11 from kidney failure at Gilchrist Hospice Care. The Pikesville resident was 92. Mr. Carton, the son of a retail clothing salesman and a homemaker, was born in Philadelphia, where he spent his early years. He moved in 1923 with his family to the city's Pimlico neighborhood.

Margaret B. "Peg" Meckley, a homemaker and a former substitute teacher, died of bladder cancer Nov. 22 at her York, Pa., home. The longtime Timonium resident was 79. Margaret Betts, the daughter of a college professor and a homemaker, was born in Iowa City, Iowa. When she was 8, she moved with her family to State College, Pa., when her father joined the faculty of Pennsylvania State University. She earned a bachelor's degree in 1952 in education from Penn State, and that same year married Robert A. Meckley.

Gladys R. Shannon, a retired Baltimore elementary school guidance counselor and an accomplished clothes maker, died Jan. 10 of complications from Alzheimer's disease at Ruxton Health and Rehabilitation Center in Pikesville. She was 78. Gladys Regina Thompson was born in Baltimore and lived in Wilson Park. After the death of her mother, she moved with a sister to an apartment in the 2500 block of Madison Ave. "We essentially raised each other. I was 14, and Gladys was 15. We went to school every day, cooked dinners each evening and helped our father in his grocery store after school and on weekends," Marian E. Spencer said.

Evelyn Ann Cables, a former secretary, substitute teacher and volunteer who lived in Smithsburg, died of cancer Oct. 5 at her home. She was 78. Born Evelyn Ann Walling, in Paterson, N.J., she graduated from Belleville (N.J.) High School in 1946. After graduation, she worked part time as a secretary at Prudential Insurance Co. in Newark while studying at what was then Seton Hall College in South Orange, N.J. She completed two years before dropping out for financial reasons. In 1953, she married Donald Walter Cables, a machinist she met after dating his best friend, according to her daughter, Karen Lynn Alban of Westminster.

A new face will join the dais where the Carroll County Board of Education sits for public meetings Wednesday. For the first time, Barbara Shreeve, the board's newest member, will vote on budget adjustments and contracts, construction policies and bid awards. Shreeve may be sitting in a more prominent seat, but she said she's not nervous about her role. "Because I've been so involved, I don't feel like a new person," said Shreeve, who substitute teaches, volunteers and has served as the PTA president.