By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher, GwinnettForum
NOV. 5, 2021 | Rodney Brundidge of Dacula, the chief operating officer of the Northeast Georgia Boy Scout Council, was telling of the various ways his organization helps children, both boys and girls, at a Gwinnett County Rotary meeting Tuesday. Then he asked: “How many in the room are Eagle Scouts?”
Two Eagles stood up. They were Art Assad and A.C. Myers, who both live in Suwanee. When later talking to Art, we got quite a story.
Earlier this week, we saw another incident, which made a major impact on us.
Catching MARTA at the airport when returning from a trip, at the College Park station two young white guys, maybe age 20-22, got on the train. One sat across from us in the handicapped seating, supposedly reserved for seniors like us. The other guy was next to him in regular seating.
Their dress was not impressive. The one across from us had with him a skateboard. We started looking at the guy himself. He had a silver-looking nose piercing with two buds attached. His left forearm past his elbow was covered in a bleached-out tattoo. His jeans were sloppy, ragged at the ends. He had on tennis shoes.
His friend was more subdued, to the point we didn’t notice much about his clothes, nor did he have a tattoo, nor ear piercing. The two talked about heading for Doraville, and we later recognized that they were going to take a Gwinnett bus to a Peachtree Industrial Boulevard location, apparently to seek employment.
Assad
Now switch to Art Assad. After the meeting, we suggested to Art: “We bet you are the success you are because you achieved Eagle status.”
“Well, it was,” he admitted. “It started on my first job interview, way back years ago. This guy, with the Chevron Company, interviewed me for about 15 minutes. And from the way it was going, I realized that I was not going to get that job. The guy concluded the meeting, and I was about to leave.
“’Wait a minute,’ he said, as I was about out the door. ‘I just saw here that you are an Eagle Scout, is that right?’ He had read that I was an Eagle Scout on my resume, so he asked me to sit down again, and we continued to talk. Fifteen minutes later, I had the job!”
That first job interview did much more. It served to kick start his career. And even today, years after that interview, our friend is still in business, president of Agrisil, an agricultural products company in Suwanee. All because that interviewer saw his Eagle Scout ranking.
Now imagine this person with the two guys headed out to Gwinnett seeking employment.
Had they been meeting with me for a job, because of the way they looked, I would have had a hard time thinking they were upstanding citizens and that I wanted to hire them. I suspect they had not achieved Eagle Scout rank, or if they had been Scouts.
Of course, in today’s tight market, that Gwinnett firm may have been happy to hire them as living, breathing workers, since today it’s so hard to find good employees.
If you have a son or daughter coming along, encourage them to achieve, in all ways, including possibly in joining Scouting…for their future.
- Have a comment? Send to: elliott@brack.net
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