Meet the Class of 2019
David Albright, Raytown High School, Class of 1972
David Albright graduated from Raytown High in 1972. After graduation, David worked locally as a photographer and video producer for Hallmark Cards for over 36 years. He used his vacation time to travel around the world helping non-profits, missionaries, and meaningful causes as a video producer. During this time, David was the recording engineer on a short children’s film that was accepted into film festivals around the country. In 2008, he became the founder and CEO of Albright Productions, continuing his career as a photographer and video producer under his own brand.
David was diagnosed with retinal detachment in both eyes in 2014. He gradually adjusted to his loss of vision with the support of his family and the life skills learned at Alphapointe, an organization dedicated to vision rehabilitation, education and advocacy, empowering people with vision loss to
achieve their goals and aspirations. Though his vocation as a photographer and video producer could not be recovered after his loss of vision, he soon realized that outside of driving, he could do just about anything. As David’s vision
began to deteriorate, he took an interest in woodworking and started attending workshops in Napa Valley. Now advanced in this new trade, David demonstrates at the annual American Association of Woodturners Conference, and he continues to
give back, teaching blind students to turn wood. David is determined to continue to serve despite his vision loss and currently leads a small group at church, is the vice-president of Knowledge Bases and Related Tools (KBART), is a member of the Ham Operator Club, and volunteers at Avenue of Life in Kansas City, Kansas. He was named Volunteer of the Year for Angel Flight Central and for Women Vision International.
From teenage summers as a Scout camp counselor to teaching community college photography classes as an adult, David has always enjoyed helping others understand what they can do with the right skills and motivation. By helping people see that his blindness has not led to depression and fear, he has helped sighted people, and those in the process of losing their own sight, understand that blindness does not lessen the fullness of life.
Louis Bradbury, Raytown High School, Class of 1964
Louis Bradbury graduated from Raytown High in 1964. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree with Honors in 1968 from Northwestern University and a Juris Doctorate degree from Harvard Law School in 1971. For the past decade, Louis has served as president of Calamus Foundation, which has granted over 25 million dollars to support important human rights initiatives and social services for many lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) organizations in New York and nationally.
Louis began his career as an attorney for the United States Department of Justice and later practiced with law firms in Washington D.C. and New York. He also served as Executive Vice President of Merrill Lynch. After joining Oxford Financial Group, he led the acquisition of Revere Copper and Brass Corporation, then a Fortune 500 company, and became its CEO and President.
In later years, he became involved in volunteer service and philanthropy. From 1990-1997, Mr. Louis served as a member of the Board of Gay Men’s Health Crisis (GMHC), the largest private HIV social services agency in the United States at that time. While President of GMHC, he oversaw a $26 million annual budget, led the creation of the first private HIV testing facility in New York, and spearheaded a $15 million capital campaign.
Mr. Bradbury was Co-Chair of Empire State Pride Agenda from 2011 to 2014. He facilitated the passage of the Dignity for All Students Act and the Marriage Equality Act, in addition to achieving more state funding for the health and human service needs of LGBT homeless and runaway youth. His awards include the Stonewall Foundation Visionary award, the New York LGBT Center Leadership award, the Judith Peabody Humanitarian award, and the Douglas Jones Leadership award. He was honored in 2000 with the Alumni Merit Award from the College of Arts and Sciences of Northwestern University.
Kelly Lyon, Raytown South High School, Class of 1983
Kelly Lyon graduated from Raytown South High in 1983 as Valedictorian. In a mostly male technical school, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Florida, she received a Computer Science degree in 1987, graduating magna cumme laude.
After graduation, Kelly began her career at Strategic Financial Planning Systems in Alexandria, Virginia, as Lead Programmer. The following year, she worked at Encore Computer in Plantation, Florida as a Software Engineer.
From 1997 to 2004, she was the Senior Programmer for Sun Microsystems, developing and leading many storage application projects with an emphasis on distributed Graphic User Interface management and cross-platform access and standards. She was the Senior Development Verification Test Engineer for Emulex Corporation, working onesite at Sun (later Oracle) in Broomfield, Colorado from 2005 to 2014.
Currently, Kelly is a team lead and Senior Software Test Engineer for Campus Management Corporation in Boca Raton, Florida. She has sole responsibility for the quality of the new Forms Builder product that allows customers to create their own web-based custom student-facing forms for all processes at a university.
Kelly has continuously worked on innovative technology and new applications with many achievements, including most recently being selected as a Stars Award Winner for Teamwork at Campus Management Corporation. This is a company-wide award given once a quarter on five pillars - teamwork, innovation, integrity, customer focus, and performance.
Kelly received a degree from the New York Institute of Photography in 2001. She sells her wildlife photographs and had two of them published in the National Wildlife Federation’s 2015 North American Wildlife calendar. You can see her work at the Gateway store at Rocky Mountain National Park Fall River Visitor Center.
Kelly has volunteered with many environmental organizations over the years, was a docent at Miami Metro Zoo, and most recently volunteered with Sea Turtle Oversight Protection (STOP) where she has saved the lives of thousands of baby sea turtles, ensuring when disoriented by manmade lighting, they still get safely to the ocean. She has traveled to six continents, including her dream trip to go on an African safari. She was an extra in an episode of Miami Vice (1989), and in 2005, she won the co-ed (mostly male) Sun Microsystems Golf League with her friend, Erin. Kelly and her husband Steven Duke, a Raytown South High Class of 1978 graduate, live in Boca Raton, Florida. Kelly is the stepmom to two sons, Ethan and Clinton.
Terry Pickett, Raytown South High School, Class of 1971
Terry Pickett graduated from Raytown South High in 1971. He graduated from William Jewell College in 1975 with degrees in Physics, Mathematics, and Business Administration and received a master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Missouri, Rolla.
Terry began his career at John Deere in 1977, when he joined the Electronic Systems group at the John Deere Product Engineering Center (PEC) in Waterloo, Iowa. His initial work included designing electronic hardware, embedded software and control systems, and soon advanced into development team leadership roles in the PEC Electronic Systems organization.
He was appointed to Manager of Engineering for the newly formed Precision Farming Group in Moline, Illinois in 1993 and later appointed to Manager of Advanced Engineering in 2000 as Agricultural Management Solutions was formed.
He has led, mentored, and facilitated innovation teams across the enterprise and has developed talent expansively both in his organization and across all regions. Terry led the development of John Deere’s StarFire system, referred to as “The Steel Plow of the 21st Century,” by the curator of the Smithsonian museum.
The team developed technology that had never been done before that time.
He currently holds over 50 patents, and he has participated with the ASABE and the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) off-road vehicle standard committees in their work on electronic environmental standards. He has authored and presented at technical society meetings in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Germany, and China on Advanced Electronic Control Systems, Precision Agriculture Systems, and the future of Precision Agriculture. In 2015, Terry was named a John Deere Fellow, and is now serving as chairman of that organization.
Terry and his wife of 42 years, Jill, currently live in Waukee, Iowa. She is a Master Gardner, Quilter, and volunteers for many organizations. They have a daughter, Valerie, a Registered Nurse and Surgical Nurse Practitioner (PhD) in Wichita, KS and two sons - Gerry is a pastor (Master of Divinity from Fuller Theological University) and IT specialist (BS in Information Systems from Iowa State) living with his wife and daughter in Kansas City, MO, and Dan is a surgeon in St. Cloud, MN.
Mansa Wakili, Raytown South High School, Class of 2006
After graduating from Raytown South High in 2006, Mansa moved to Los Angeles to continue to follow his dream of making a career with his music.
After years of hard work, dedication to his craft, and making connections in the music industry, he was nominated for a Grammy for his musical work for the Fox network hit television show, Empire. His body of work is expansive and remarkable. He has written, produced and/or created music for many movies and television shows, including Spiderman Homecoming, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul, and Club Mickey Mouse, to name a few.
Under the stage name chief waKiL, he won the Best Original Song award from the International Online Cinema Awards (INOCA) for his work on The Lego Batman Movie. He won an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor for his work on the TV show Giants.
Mansa’s original goal was to make it as a recording artist, and he still writes and produces his own music; however, also choosing to write and produce music for movies and television, has allowed him to work with some of the best writers and producers in the business. He now has his own production company called Kil Society. Genres of music covered by his production company include Electronic Dance Music (EDM), Hip-Hop, Pop, Pop-Rock, R&B, Soul, and Soundtrack music.
His work, some of which was outside his comfort zone, has allowed him to become a well-rounded musician and has taught him the value of collaborating with others. Mansa enjoys sharing with the next generation of students who are interested in a career in the music and entertainment industry, he enjoys giving students insight into how to get started in this industry.