THREE HONORARY DEGREES CONFERRED AT B-CC SUMMER COMMENCEMENT

DAYTONA BEACH,  FL – Bethune-Cookman College conferred three honorary degrees at its summer commencement ceremony on Saturday, June 26, 2004 in the Mary McLeod Bethune Performing Arts Center. 

Recipients were Dr. William S. Barnes, George McPhillips and Dr. Bob Williams. Barnes served as the commencement speaker that day. 

Having served more than thirty years in the Florida Conference, Barnes’ appointments have included rural, suburban, and urban churches, as well as Chaplain of Florida Southern College, where he is also currently a member of the Board of Trustees.

After graduating from high school in St. Petersburg, Florida, Dr. Barnes continued his education at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, where he received both the Bachelor of Business Administration degree (Summa Cum Laude), and the Master of Divinity degree (Magna Cum Laude). He is a strong supporter of higher education and a devoted advocate of Bethune-Cookman College.

He is the Founder and President Emeritus of Shepherd’s Hope, a nationally recognized and acclaimed ministry of free health centers for the low-income uninsured. There are currently nine facilities providing health care to thousands of persons in Central Florida. His commitment to social justice and reconciliation have made him the recipient of numerous awards and honors, and under his leadership St. Luke’s has been significantly involved in the peace and reconciliation initiatives in Northern Ireland since 1995.

He is married to Kim Houser Barnes of Fort Lauderdale, and they are the proud parents of two daughters, Kristin Barnes Allgire and Meredith Alissa Barnes.

McPhillips currently serves as a member of the Board of Trustees at Bethune-Cookman College, and he was recently appointed a member of the Executive Committee of the Board.  Mr. McPhillips served as a member of the Board of Trustees at Elmira College, Elmira, New York, from 1973-1979.  He is also a member of the Chancellor’s Council at Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York.

While serving in the eighth U. S. Air Force during World War II, he flew 35 combat missions over Europe in a B-17.  After his military service, Mr. McPhillips earned the Bachelor of Science degree in the School of Management in 1949 at Syracuse University. 

A Corporate Real Estate Executive in the petroleum and supermarket industries for 41 years, he holds the designation of Master of Corporate Real Estate (MCR).  Mr. McPhillips was a founding member of the National Association of Corporate Real Estate Executives (NACORE), and he was a member of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) for 33 years. 

He was an active volunteer for several organizations, including the Shriners Children’s Hospital in the Springfield, Massachusetts, before making his home in Ormond Beach, Florida.  He and his wife are very involved at Bethune-Cookman College, especially in the School of Nursing and the Office of College Advancement.

McPhillips has been married to Margaret Judson McPhillips for 58 years.  They have a daughter, Mary Beth Maloney; a son, Mark; and two grandsons, Peter and David Maloney.

Williams is currently the Principal Investigator and Executive Director of the National Science Foundation Advanced Technology Education Center known as iTEC, the Information Technology Education Center in Florida. He also serves as Vice President for Economic Development at Daytona Beach Community College.

His past work experience includes eight years working for IBM as part of the IBM PC development team. He held various positions at IBM including Software Engineer, Operating System Architect and Software Development Manager.  During this time he published eleven invention disclosures, filed three patents and also co-authored a book titled “OS/2: Features, Functions, and Applications” that was translated into seven languages worldwide and sold over thirty thousand copies.

In 1990, he joined the founding team of a software startup called Citrix Systems where he held several positions including Director of Worldwide Systems Engineering and Director of Architecture.  Citrix went public in 1995 and now has a market capitalization of over three billion dollars. He joined the faculty of Daytona Beach Community College in 1997, and chaired the Computer Science and Engineering Technology Department.  He is a graduate of DBCC, and holds Bachelors and Masters Degrees in Computer Science from the college of Engineering at the University of South Florida.

Williams and his wife, Jill, have two children, Jonathan 17 and Janelle 14.

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Bethune-Cookman is a comprehensive college, which offers degrees in liberal arts as well as professional fields, such as business, education and nursing. A United Methodist Church-affiliated school, the College has a diverse and international student population of more than 2,700 and a solid reputation for academic excellence and community service. As evidence of its outstanding program, the College has been listed in the Templeton Honor Roll of Character Building Colleges and Universities, and it was ranked by Black Enterprise magazine as one of the “Top 50” schools in the nation for black students.  B-CC is one of 10 charter member colleges of Project Pericles, a program to create civic leadership and involvement on its member campuses.  The College will celebrate its 100^th year of founding on October 4, 2004.

For more information, contact our website www.bethune.cookman.edu. 

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