Hope of Glory: From Night to Day

Rufus Carpenter is an African American father of a thirteen-year-old son and three adult sons. Like many other African American parents, Mr. Carpenter struggles against long odds to steer his children safely through their formative years to become productive citizens. As he watched so many families struggle with problems like academic failure, drugs, sex, and violence, he wondered if there was a way he could help. He’s spent the last sixteen years of his life working to solve this issue. He developed an idea for a prevention/intervention program called Urban Performing Arts System - a Rites of Passage initiative. He is the CEO and commissioner of Urban Games Society Inc., a nonprofit child guidance and youth self-help agency that provides for the welfare of children in such areas as academic failure prevention, drug abuse prevention, life skills training, and positive social development. His business career positions have included: senior vice president, area manager and managing partner for Northlake Foods Inc. Mr. Carpenter was consistently recognized as the prevailing leader and driving force of leadership that designed and implemented the company’s operational midlevel executives training programs. These programs brought awareness and knowledge of his special ability of promoting closer working relationships among a diverse group of people in a business environment. He has dedicated his professional life to the continuous and dynamic force in the development of people. Mr. Carpenter, a native of Virginia and a US Army retiree, received numerous civic and professional awards and honors during his twenty-year military career. In recognition for his outstanding accomplishments during the Gulf Crisis, Mr. Carpenter’s portrait has been placed in the Army Transportation Museum at Fort Eustis, Virginia.