Social Worker, Teacher, Banker, Musician, and Civil Servant Recognized as Maple Hts. Pathfinders

Five Maple Hts. HS alumni win recognition

Event celebrates Black History Month

Five accomplished graduates of Maple Heights High School are being recognized this week at the school's 16th annual Pathfinders Assembly for their success in the areas of education, humanitarianism, citizenship/government, business, and the arts and sciences.

Marcyline L. Bailey, LCSW

Maple Hts. HS '78

The Humanitarianism Award recipient is Marcyline L. Bailey, LCSW [Class of 1978].  The Pathfinders Humanitarianism Award honors those in the fields of social and community service who dedicate themselves to the betterment of others and to helping others to reach their happiest, greatest potential.

Bailey attended Northwestern University where she earned a B. A. in Linguistics.  She later earned a Master’s of Social Science Administration from the Mandel School of Social Work at Case Western Reserve University.  Currently Bailey is a certified social worker at Glynn County Schools in Brunswick, Georgia, providing assessments, interventions, and coordination of community support services to students, families, and school staff.  In addition she is the owner of M.L. Bailey Consulting, Inc. where she provides psychotherapy and therapeutic interventions to individuals, couples, families and group.   She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority.

Citizenship and Government

Phillip E. Beasley
Maple Hts. HS '01

Phillip E. Beasley is the recipient of this year’s Citizenship and Government Award. Beasley received his B. S. in technology from Kent State University and went on to earn a M. S. in management from Indiana Wesleyan University. 

Beasley serves as Logistics Readiness Officer with the United States Air Force – Air National Guard, as well as a Lead IT Acquisition Specialist for the Department of Defense, Office of Inspector General. Beasley specializes in helping people to maximize their potential and thereby increase organizational effectiveness through the use of strategic leadership principles, effective communication skills, and management of organizational resources.

Beasley’s work experience has included being an Investigator for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, an IT Manager for General Service Administration Federal Acquisition Service, and an IT Project Manager for the United States Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agricultural Service.

Education

Jalen M. Brown
Maple Hts. HS '13

Jalen M. Brown, valedictorian of the Class of 2013, is winner of this year’s Education Award.  Brown is presently an assistant principal at Lander Elementary in Mayfield. He began his teaching career in his hometown as a social studies teacher at Milkovich Middle School, after receiving his B.A. degree from Miami University. He has gone on to earn his master’s in education administration, teach  abroad in Luxembourg, and start a nonprofit mentoring group, Unleashing Black Minds. He joined the Maple Heights school board last month, after winning election by a landslide in November.

While in high school, Jason was a member of the National Honor Society, president of the student council, and served as Vice President of Future Educators of America at both the State and National levels. He is a member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity.

Business

Purnell Sweeney
Maple Hts. HS '03

Purnell Sweeney, currently a Vice President/Project Manager, Sr. for JPMorgan Chase in Columbus, is the recipient of this year’s Business Award. He earned his B.A. in business administration from Urbana University before going on to earn his master’s in management from Ohio Dominican University.

Sweeney oversees collaborative teams that develop and implement client focused strategies aimed at building strong client relationships with business partners. His career highlights include being named as one of 60 branch managers in the Nation selected for an executive management program specializing in high complex branches and winning recognition as the top banker in the region while at Woodforest National Bank, where he began his career as a personal banker.  Cochair and co-founder of Mid-Ohio Central District Diversity Council, Sweeney also takes time to mentors new associates. Sweeney is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity and the founding president of Urbana University’s black student union. 

Arts and Sciences

Leon Turner

Leon Turner, currently music director for R&B superstar, Gladys Knight is this year’s Arts and Science Awards recipient. Turner travels with Gladys Knight’s R&B Shows, Piano Duo Shows, as well as her Grammy-winning gospel choir shows. He produced and played on Gladys Knight’s gospel album, “Where My Heart Belongs,” which won an NAACP Image Award. Last year, he had the honor of arranging the National Anthem for SuperBowl LIII. 

Music has always been a part of Turner’s life.  Born and raised into a musical family in Cleveland, he performed with the family ensemble, the Turner Singers from grade school into high school. In 2006, Turner began his professional career with gospel sensation J. Moss, specializing in keyboards.  He has gone on to work with such illustrious acts as Stevie Wonder, Dionne Warwick, Yolanda Adams, Eddie Levert of the O’Jays, Donnie McClurkin, Bobby Brown, Ralph Tresvant and Johnny Gill.  No music genre seems foreign to him — whether jazz, R&B, gospel, classical or country. He is also the owner of Turner Productions, LLC.

The Pathfinders Program was created to recognize individuals who have found or created a path of success for students to follow.  In addition to recognizing outstanding graduates, the annual assembly, coinciding with Black History Month, is designed to inspire students to achieve goals they set for themselves throughout their lives.

This year’s assembly is being held today from 9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. at the school district’s Wylie Athletic Complex, One Mustang Way [44137].

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Cleveland's Sorry Sports Scene, Richard Sherman, urban trollers, Jazz, Black History Month

Since this is a commentary about Cleveland’s abysmal professional sports environment, I probably should post it tomorrow on Ground Hog Day. Like the movie, we seem to relive the same scenes over and over.

Collectively, the Haslam Browns, the Gilbert Cavaliers and the Dolan Indians are about as sad a trio of professional sports teams as exist in America. It would pain me less to acknowledge this sorry truth if I hadn’t been infected with an especially virulent case of hometown sports fever back in the Fifties. The Browns were the best team in pro football the first decade of my life, and the Indians won a couple of pennants and even a World Series during that same decade, though I hadn’t yet become emotionally chained to the city.

Even those glory days come with historical asterisks, however. The Browns’ best teams pre-dated the Super Bowl era, and several even pre-dated their admission to the NFL. The 1964 championship Browns team can be seen pretty much as an anomaly that unfortunately obscured the magisterially micro-mismanagement skills of one Art Modell.

Sad to say, the best three year football stretch in Cleveland over the past two decades occurred in those three or four years in the late ‘90s when we had no NFL entry.

The Cleveland Cavaliers were born during my early adulthood but still snuck into my sports heart. My favorite Cavs teams was the Miracle of Richfield bunch of the late ‘70s. They played as a unit, unselfishly sharing the ball. It didn’t matter who took the shot. Subsequent Cavs teams have had better talent. While this year’s team has some excellent talent, they play so disjointedly, selfishly, and with so little basketball intelligence that they are actually ugly to watch. [Exceptions: Andy Varajao, Tristan Thompson and newcomer Luol Deng.]

The Dolan baseball club is probably the best managed of Cleveland’s professional sports teams. However, they operate with the least money in the sport where money matters most. And they will be rightly cursed so long as they support the ugliest and most racist totem in pro sports.

I am given to occasionally reading the comments on various news stories of civic importance. I know beforehand that if the story involves any element of race or “inner-city” or increasingly, inner-ring suburbia, the commenters will be especially vitriolic. This phenomenon extended this week even to the announcement that The Ohio State University has selected an accomplished African American as its next president. While I don’t recall either the Plain Dealer or the Columbus Dispatch making much if any reference to his race, there was a healthy dosage of affirmative action commentary among the trolls. I suspect that these people are among the Chief Wahoo’s most fervent defenders.

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On a related note, these trollers are probably among the most vociferous attackers of the tastefully named Richard Sherman, star cornerback of the Seattle Seahawks. Sherman was the hyper vocal face of the Seahawks who made amped up over-the-top Muhammad Ali-like comments when a microphone was stuck in his face immediately after he made a tremendously acrobatic play that ensured his team would be in tomorrow’s Super Bowl. Sherman’s intemperate, adrenaline-fueled remarks, coupled with his defiant manner and flowing dreadlocks, made it easy for incognito critics to call him a thug. While a gladiator on the field, Richard Sherman is actually one of the most intelligent, best-educated and thoughtful professional athletes on the scene today. Doubters may want to take a look at this profile of the man, written before the season started.

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We intend in 2014 to do a better job providing local coverage of what some like to call “America’s music”, more familiarly known as jazz. We start with noting tonight’s Nighttown appearance of Dr. Phillip Martin [hat tip to local jazz aficionado Evan Morse]. Saxophonist Martin is crafting a dual career as a jazz sax man [clearly influenced by Grover Washington] with being a practicing dentist in Washington DC. For more info on tonight’s show, which starts at 8:30PM, visit here or here.

Elsewhere, also in Cleveland Heights, local singer Anita Keys will be performing at Rockefellers, 3099 Mayfield Road. Call 216.321.0477 for more info.

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Finally, I was initially hilarious when I first heard about Atlanta’s two-inch blizzard earlier in the week. I became more sensitive as I learned about stranded students, the elderly, distraught caregivers, and expectant mothers.

I turned off the cable news accounts as “the snow event” [the Atlanta local’s current term of art] because of the disgusting efforts of the so-called news broadcasters efforts to assign blame. [Those folk would fit in well in Cleveland.]

No doubt, some of those castigating public officials, from the governor on down, were those opposed to almost all non-military government spending.

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Today is the first day of Black History Month. In a few days the primary election season will be in full spring for a host of state, county, and local offices, including judicial races. Your Congressman will also be on the ballot.

There is a relationship between our history, the kind of policies our government advances or retards, who become our community spokespersons, the quality of our educational systems, the future of our children and our communities, and how involved we are in the political and civic process. Voting in the May primary is an essential duty. But it is not sufficient. Now is not too early to begin the process of self-education about who is running and doing some serious candidate vetting. We will do our part to help.

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