{"id":969,"date":"2012-03-07T22:02:41","date_gmt":"2012-03-07T22:02:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/jsuflash\/?p=969"},"modified":"2012-03-07T22:02:41","modified_gmt":"2012-03-07T22:02:41","slug":"triumphant-jackson-state-alum-holds-book-signing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/2012\/03\/07\/triumphant-jackson-state-alum-holds-book-signing\/","title":{"rendered":"Triumphant Jackson State alum holds book signing"},"content":{"rendered":"

De\u2019Arbreya Lee<\/strong>
\nBlue & White Flash \/ Staff Writer<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jackson State University\u2019s book store welcomed home 2004 alum Antonio Wright for the book signing of his autobiographical work, \u201cFrom a Label to a Brand\u201d on February 28, 2012.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe that God has a plan for everybody and he gives you everything that you need. It\u2019s not what you go through, its how you go through it,\u201d said Wright.<\/p>\n

With dreams of becoming a JSU Tiger since the third grade, Wright enrolled in 1996 but the following year would bring several major alterations to Wright\u2019s plans. His aspirations of becoming a part of the JSU football team ended a day before his spring training of his senior season when he was involved in a car accident that left him paralyzed. Exactly one month to the date of Wright\u2019s accident, his youngest brother was murdered.<\/p>\n

\u201cLife is a gift, but living takes an effort,\u201d said Wright.<\/p>\n

After returning to Jackson State in the year 2000, Wright coached fitness conditioning for several sports, including football, softball, women\u2019s basketball and volleyball. He graduated from the university with a bachelor\u2019s degree in physical education and a minor in kinesiology.<\/p>\n

Despite the tragedies that Wright faced early in life, he made his life changing experiences into triumph with the publication of his autobiography \u201cFrom a Label to a Brand\u201d published on December 13 of last year by BePublished.org.<\/p>\n

In the book, Wright invites his readers into his life, discussing various topics such as hopes, tragedies, relationships, and sports stating that he wanted his struggles and triumps to inspire others to persevere in the face life-altering, challenges.<\/p>\n

Among his other endeavors, Wright founded the non-profit organization, Metro Area Community Empowerment Foundation (MACE) to reach out to others with spinal cord injuries (SCI).<\/p>\n

The mission of the MACE foundation is to promote community empowerment through wheelchair sports and recreation, youth mentoring, and connecting all organizations and advocacy for people with disabilities.<\/p>\n

In teaching wheelchair basketball, softball and tennis, the MACE foundation takes sport chairs across the state teaching clinics about wheelchair sports and conducting youth mentoring programs.<\/p>\n

Wright\u00a0 explained that in some cases, the roles of the \u201cable bodied persons\u201d players are switched.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe put people [able bodied persons] in wheelchairs and we\u2019ll spot them off 50 points. It just gives you a different look on life because you become the one that is disabled, not me,\u201d said Wright.<\/p>\n

To see the foundation in action,\u00a0 the\u00a0 MACE \u201cWeekend of Victory\u201d, featuring the Rolling Tigers Wheelchair & Sports Recreation Team will compete on March 16-18 as a part of the Gulf Coast Conference Wheelchair Basketball Championship at the Walter Payton Center.<\/p>\n

Wright has managed to keep the Tiger spirit within him despite never wearing a football jersey.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do believe that God has a plan for everybody. If He puts you in it, He believes in you. If He could put that much on my shoulders, that means that He must really have some faith in what I can do in Him,\u201d said Wright.<\/p>\n

For more information about MACE and \u201cFrom a Label to a Brand\u201d, log onto www.macemississippi.org or www.amazon.com for book purchasing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

De\u2019Arbreya Lee Blue & White Flash \/ Staff Writer Jackson State University\u2019s book store welcomed home 2004 alum Antonio Wright for the book signing of his autobiographical work, \u201cFrom a Label to a Brand\u201d on February 28, 2012. \u201cI believe that God has a plan for everybody and he gives you everything that you need. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-969","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-campus-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/969\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.jsums.edu\/theflash\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}