2024 Wall of Achievement
By Bonnie Slabaugh Abbey:
The Brush High School Alumni Association recently honored eight inductees into its Wall of Achievement. The purpose of this “wall” is to recognize and honor graduates of Brush who have displayed outstanding achievement in areas such as leadership, service to the community, service to Brush High School, humanitarianism, creativity, courage, and careers which have benefited others. Brush staff members who may not have graduated from the high school may also be honored.
On November 14, at La Vera Party Center, inductees included Jeanne Johns '81, Earl Miller '81, John Slosar '74, Richard Rood '74, Philip Setzer '69, Jim & Linda Meredith Makee '60, and Norm Rogozin '63. Also honored were the twelve highest achieving juniors and seniors at Brush High School. Prior to the dinner, inductees meet with the current Brush students to pass on the legacy and tradition of Brush High School and to share how their journey from Brush High School led them to where they are today.
Jeanne Johns spent most of her career with BP, including as President of North America Natural Gas Liquids, overseeing a $12 billion business with 850 employees, forty-five locations, 12,600 miles of pipeline, and marketing of 485,000 barrels a day of ethane, propane, butane, condensate, and sulfur. She tripled the profitability of the business and improved safety 40% during her tenure. She finished her career as the CEO and Managing Director of IncitecPivot, a global leader in civil explosives and the leading Australian fertilizer company.
Earl Miller, an MIT neuroscientist and professor, has changed the way people think about the brain's working memory. Besides making frequent appearances in the popular press and being profiled in Discover Magazine and The New Yorker, he has bequeathed $4 million to establish a charitable trust creating scholarships for disadvantaged students at Kent State University.
John Slosar returned for this award from Hong Kong where he has lived and worked for the past 44 years. He was recruited out of college at Cambridge, England to work at The Squire Group, becoming the first American Chairman of the company. The most notable business of The Squire Group is Cathay Pacific Airways, Hong Kong's major international airline, and the Coca Cola bottlers in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and the USA. Also, in what has become somewhat typical of Brush grads, musicianship prevails---John has, on more than one occasion, sung and played keyboard on stage with the Beach Boys!
Richard Rood is a Grammy Award–winning violinist based in New York City. His career has spanned classical music, chamber music, contemporary jazz, and commercial music including Broadway and motion picture soundtracks. He is on the music faculty at Columbia University and Sarah Lawrence College. Richard is currently Associate Concertmaster of the Santa Fe Opera, a member of the American Ballet Theater Orchestra, and a principal player with the American Symphony.
Philip Setzer is a professional violinist, having formed the Emerson String Quartet in 1976. The Emerson String Quartet has won 9 Grammy Awards including two for “Best Classical Album”. Time Magazine calls the group “America's greatest quartet!” Having both parents as professional violinists with the Cleveland Orchestra, Philip began playing and studying violin at age 4. He graduated from The Juilliard School, and holds five honorary doctorate degrees.
Jim & Linda Meredith Makee have been sweethearts since the “Heart Hop” in 1958! Jim started his career as a teacher in the SEL system, and became the youngest principal ever hired by SEL. He was instrumental in the reopening of Greenview as an upper elementary school. He is a Jennings Scholar, a Weatherhead Scholar, and a Dale Carnegie Scholar. Linda became certified as a gifted education teacher, and further studied abroad in Switzerland and Paris. She served SEL as an ESL tutor, taught French and English at two schools, and served as the district's gifted education coordinator. In what Linda calls the “best of ALL professions,” she is the mother of four, the grandmother of fourteen, and the great-grandmother of one! Both were instrumental in the creation of the Brush Alumni Association in 1991.
