By BRENNAN LEATHERS and CAROLYN IAMON

News Writers

Three retired educators received special recognition during Monday’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day events.

They were Pauline Love-Gaines, who also served as the MLK Jr. Day parade’s grand marshal; Gwendolyn Conyers and Mary Gant.

Love-Gaines, an alumnus of the former Hutto High School, taught in Decatur County Schools from 1952 until 1998 as a fourth-grade teacher, instructor of physical sciences, assistant principal of Bainbridge High School and as a part-time attendance officer. She holds education degrees from the University of Georgia, Valdosta State College, Indiana University and Spelman College in Atlanta.

She is a past president of the Bainbridge-Decatur County Retired Educators Association. She is the founder/advisor of the Love Education Assistance Fund and secretary of the Decatur County branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She is also actively involved in First African Baptist Church.

Gant and Conyers, both longtime local educators, retired from their roles as GED examiners in 2011.

Gant, a native of Richland, Ga., first became involved with GED in the 1980s while employed as a counselor at Bainbridge High School. She was a part-time examiner until her retirement from BHS in 1992 and served as a full-time examiner until 2011. She holds education degrees from Savannah State College, Columbia University in New York and the University of Georgia.

Gwendolyn Conyers, the wife of longtime Bainbridge City Councilman Luther Conyers, devoted 18 years to the GED program as an examiner. She began there in 1993 after she retired from teaching business courses at Bainbridge High School. Her first teaching position was at Mount Moriah High School in the 1950s. From there she went to Hutto High School, then Bainbridge High School in 1970. She has also taught night courses at Bainbridge College.

Conyers is also a graduate of Savannah State College, with a Bachelor of Science in Business Education. She has a master’s degree from Indiana University and an education specialist degree from the University of Georgia.