“Welcome Home Event for Leon Powe of the Boston Celtics”

Youth Forum & Basketball Game

at Oracle Arena, Oakland Coliseum

Friday, December 29, 2006

An exciting Youth Forum and Basketball Game for mostly inner-city youth (boys and girls) and their parents and mentors were held at Oracle Arena in the Oakland Coliseum Complex on Friday, December 29, 2006.  Some 75 youth (ages 7 to 20) participated along with 50 adults. The events were organized by Darryl McMillon of the MAPP Coalition (first-year CCF sub-award organization), Urban Services YMCA, and The Mentoring Center. Other co-sponsors included the Charles P. Foster Foundation (a new third-year CCF sub-award organization), The Jabez Project, and Center of Hope Community Church and First AME Church, both of Oakland, CA.

            The purpose of the events was to encourage the youth to set goals, to believe they are attainable and work hard to achieve them.  The event also let the youth know that their parents and other caring adults are there to support them on their way to greatness and to discuss why even more adults, black men in particular, are needed to step up as Father Figures and Role Models. The centerpiece of the program was a “welcome back home” to Leon Powe, a 22-year old professional basketball player in his rookie season with the Boston Celtics who was raised in difficult circumstances in Oakland, graduated from Oakland Tech High School, and played for three years for the Cal Bears at UC Berkeley before being drafted in the NBA.

            The afternoon started with basketball games on the home court of the Oakland Warriors. The kids had a wonderful time playing in such a professional arena with their parents and mentors cheering them on. After 60-minutes of games, everyone went upstairs to a large room for the forum.

            Darryl McMillon opened the Forum by telling the youth that “you can set and reach your highest goals, but it’s going to take your determination and hard work to do so.” He told about his own troubled youth of drug use and a drug-using father and how mentors helped turn him in a positive direction.

            Bernard Ward, adult mentor to Leon Powe, said that he “saw greatness” in Leon and reached out to him. He saw that even though Leon had no male role models and had bounced from foster home to foster home that he had potential to be a fine person and have a successful life. So Bernard reached out to Leon and has now befriended and mentored him for several years.   

Leon Powe was then introduced to cheers and applause. He said, “Bernard told me to focus on school first, and then basketball. So with Bernard’s fatherly encouragement and help from my teachers and tutors I rose from 0.83 GPA in middle school, to 3.0 GPA as a junior in high school, and to a 3.8 as a high school senior!” He told the youth, “If you put in the work, you get the results! If you work hard, anything can happen!” He said that even though he is now a well-paid professional basketball player, he still wants to go back to UC Berkeley, finish his final year of college and get his degree.

Bernard then added, “The key to this young man’s success is that he listened! So listen to your parents and other adult authorities, and put school first. If you do, you can achieve anything.”

At the end of the forum an episode from “The Fresh Prince” with Will Smith was played where Will’s character, who grew up without his dad for 14 years, was re-introduced to his dad and after cautiously opening up to him, he was abandoned again by his dad and was consoled by his uncle Phil who had been his father figure for many years.  At the conclusion of the emotional show Darryl said, “Some of you didn’t know your dad or didn’t have a good relationship with him. Therefore, you’re going to have to have an inner conviction on your own that you can succeed and fulfill your potential. You have unlimited potential to achieve greatness; therefore, set high goals and don’t ever stop working towards them until you reach them!”

From the interactions and audience feedback on the topics presented for discussion, it appeared that the youth and adults had a very good experience. After the forum, many of the participants went out to a local restaurant for an early dinner and then returned to attend the Warriors-Celtics game later that night.  Follow-up efforts are underway to find additional mentors and “Father Figures” for the youth who attended the event through a local recruitment campaign now underway by the event sponsors.