Lima Schools Hall of Fame inspires future graduates

LIMA – Schools in Lima inducted eight alumni and a service group into its Alumni Hall of Fame on Thursday, bringing some of the school district’s most accomplished alumni back to the school to inspire students.

Hall of Fame inductees, selected for their accomplishments and “living example” to the Lima community, met with students from Lima Senior and the South Science & Technology Magnet School to discuss their careers and education that got them there.

For the inductee, Major Kevin Hooker, graduated from Lima Senior in 1998, the path to becoming a licensed social worker and mental health flight commander with the U.S. Air Force began with the dream of training whales in Sea World.

He has since been deployed to Afghanistan as a social worker and clinician specializing in combat sexual assault, witnesses to the 2012 mass shooting in Aura, Colorado advised.

For Dr. Melvin Glover, who graduated in 1994, the journey to becoming a family physician began with the dream of becoming a lawyer. Instead, he went to medical school and now runs his own family practice near Cleveland.

Schools in Lima have inducted a new class of distinguished alumni into its Hall of Fame every three years since 1978, but Thursday’s ceremony has been delayed by more than a year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Hooker and Glover were recognized on Thursday alongside former Lima Senior students Dr Jeremy Heffner, Robert Long, Jessika Phillips, Col. Charles Smith and Judge RicKard Workman.

The latest class of inductees also recognized the late Merlin Szasz, an alumnus of South 1954, and added the Lima Kiwanis Club as an honorary member for its services to Lima schools.

Dr Melvin Glover, a family physician near Cleveland and graduated from Lima Senior in 1994, answered questions about the medical field of Lima Senior patient care students on Thursday before joining the Hall of Fame.

Maj.Kevin Hooker, a mental health flight commander at U.S. Air Force Joint Base McGuire-Dix-: Lakehurst in New Jersey, spoke to health students from Lima High School on Thursday. Hooker was one of seven Lima Senior alumni inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame that evening.