Tulsa school board hopeful Percefull sees inner-city need
ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
02/02/2003
Tulsa World (Final Home Edition), Page A27 of News

A few years of volunteering opened Gary Percefull's eyes to the needs of Tulsa's inner-city schools. Percefull is running for the District 1 TPS School Board seat.
JAMES GIBBARD / Tulsa World

A few years of volunteering opened Gary Percefull's eyes to the needs of Tulsa's inner-city schools. Now the public relations consultant is running for an open seat on the Tulsa school board.

The 48-year-old longtime Tulsa resident will face Loyce Manning in the Feb. 11 election to represent District 1, which includes Webster and Central high schools and their feeder schools.

During his four-year service on the board of the Community Service Council, Percefull became involved in a grass-roots group called the East Tulsa Prevention Coalition, which seeks to better coordinate some services of the city, schools and churches in that area.

Percefull began reading to young children through a community literacy effort by volunteers. He said the experience was eye-opening.

"How starved some of them were for just basic attention -- it just blew me away. I had not had that experience before," he said.

Percefull's only child -- a son who is now 19 -- grew up with his mother in Kansas, so Percefull admits that he lacks a perspective of the "day-to-day education" of school-age children.

But he and his wife, Linda Jordan, have taken a monthly interest at Park Elementary School, which is located near their small public relations firm, the Scissortail Group, in west Tulsa.

Each month the firm awards its Scissortail Citizenship Award and lapel pin depicting the Oklahoma state bird to Park students through the Partners in Education program.

And Percefull himself has spent an hour every Friday morning for the past two school years mentoring a boy who is currently in the fifth grade.

Before taking on his current work in public relations, which has included quite a bit of political campaigning, Percefull was a Tulsa World reporter.

For 15 years he worked as an observer of politics, government, crime and fires and with his own small firm, Percefull has helped others communicate their beliefs and seek public office.

So it's not surprising that Percefull admits feeling a little out of place in his new role as office-seeker.

"I like helping with campaigns. I'd never considered being a candidate," he said.

Percefull said he was surprised but honored when school board member Bobbie Gray asked him to run. He said he received further encouragement from members Ruth Ann Fate and Matt Livingood and from former District 1 member Mark Barcus.

"I go from being excited, man there's a lot of opportunity here. People are waiting for something to happen. Then I go, 'wow, this is so big and complicated,' " he said.

Percefull got an intimate view of the politics of public education in Tulsa by serving on the district's suspension task force last year, which had several of its recommendations implemented by the school board.

"I'm not an education expert, but I believe public schools are the foundation of a healthy community," he said.

"I come with no agenda, no axe to grind, just interest."