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Player, Willa Beatrice
2 articles on Player, Willa Beatrice
Player, Willa Beatrice

Source: African American National Biography
Word Count: 1039 Includes: Further Reading(9 Aug. 1909–27 Aug. 2003), educator and college president, was born in Jackson, Mississippi, the youngest of three children born to Clarence Player, a plasterer and contractor, and Beatrice Day. Devout members of the Methodist faith, the Players involved Willa in Sunday school, the youth choir, and other church organizations. When the family relocated to Akron, Ohio, in 1916, she completed her elementary and high school education in the Akron public schools. After briefly attending Akron University, she followed her sister to Ohio Wesleyan University, in Delaware, Ohio, where she earned a BA in Latin and French in 1929. She was the first black student teacher in the Akron public schools in 1929. She received her MA in French from Oberlin College in Ohio in 1930. Awarded a Fulbright Fellowship in ...
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Source: Black Women in America, Second Edition
Word Count: 1037 Includes: Bibliography(b. 9 August 1909 ; d. 2 7 August 2003 ),
educator. Player was the first in a number of areas concerning black women in the field of education. She was the first black woman to run a four-year, fully accredited liberal arts college in the United States; the first woman president of the National Association of Schools and Colleges of the Methodist Church, and the first black woman to serve as trustee of Ohio Wesleyan University.Player was born in Jackson, Mississippi. Her parents, Beatrice Day and Clarence Cromwell Player , moved the family to Akron, Ohio, in 1917 . There Willa attended public schools and eventually Akron University and then Ohio Wesleyan. While at Akron University she served as the first ...
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