Funeral service for Marcille Southerland-Covey will be 10:00 a.m. Tuesday, August 22, 2017, in Centenary United Methodist Church with Dr. Robert Gorrell, Senior Pastor, and Rev. Phil Jones officiating.

Burial will follow in Sunset Memorial Gardens under direction of Becker-Rabon Funeral Home.

Marcille Southerland-Covey, age 82, Lawton, died Friday, August 18, 2017 in Lawton.  She was born September 3, 1934 in Idabel, Oklahoma to John Raymond Burns and Dorothy Ione (Laney) Burns. The family moved to Lawton in 1942. Marcille graduated from Lawton High School in 1952. She graduated from Cameron Junior College in 1954. She received her BS degree from Oklahoma College for Women, Chickasha in 1965 and her Master's Degree in elementary administration from the University of Oklahoma in 1975.

Marcille was employed by the Lawton Public Schools in 1965 and retired in 1993. Her teaching career included:1965-66 Garfield Elementary third grade teacher; 1966-73 Lee Elementary fourth and sixth grade teacher; 1973-75 Curriculum Director for the new School for Children of Working Parents at Douglass Elementary; 1975-77 Principal of John Adams Elementary; 1977-79 Liberty Elementary in Tulsa County; 1979-80 Assistant Principal of Sheridan Road Elementary; 1980-81 Assistant Principal of Geronimo Road Elementary; 1981-85 Principal of Kuntz Elementary; 1985-90 Principal of Jefferson Elementary; 1990-93 Principal of Swinney Elementary.

Marcille was a charter president of the Professional Educators Association of Lawton (PEAL) and served on the Oklahoma Education Association's Board of Directors where she was a lifetime member. She was a past president of the Lawton Area Reading Council (LARC). She was a past president of the Comanche County Retired Educators Association and was a lifetime member of the Oklahoma Retired Educators Association. She was a member of Centenary United Methodist Church where she had served on many committees and as a LOGOS table parent. She was a member of the Questor's Sunday School Class and active in the Wednesday Morning Life Class.

She is survived by two sons: Paul Blake Southerland and his wife Becky of Oklahoma City, and Steve Southerland of Lawton; and by seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her parents, her brother John Thomas Burns, and by a son, Richard Laney Southerland.

Memorial contributions may be made to the American Cancer Society or the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation.

An online guest book and sympathy cards are available at www.beckerfuneral.com .