Mal Mathews
Mal knew from the time he was 12 years old that he would begin his college education at Jackson State Community College. First, he attended the 1979 Miss Jackson State Community College Pageant which sparked his interest in the Miss America Program. Second, Miss Genevieve R. Brooks and Miss Joy Nelms would pick Mal up to take him to Jackson State's basketball games. That relationship also started in 1979. Mal remembers sitting at one of the games and Miss Brooks saying to him and a few others, "Mal will be SGA President." Several years later, her words become a reality.
Mal is from Jackson, Tennessee and a 1985 graduate of Jackson Central Merry High School. As fate would have it, he enrolled at J.S.C.C. in the Fall of 1985. He was very active on campus. He sang in the gospel choir and with the band "Destiny". He was elected SGA President for the 1987-88 school year and also worked in the reading lab. He graduated in 1988 and matriculated to Tennessee State University where he graduated with a degree in Mass Communications in 1991. In 1995 he earned his master's degree in education from Freed-Hardeman University.
Mal is an active member of Hurt's Chapel C.M.E. Church, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc., and is on the executive board of the Jackson-Madison County Education Association.
He loves to sing and has sung the national anthem and Canadian Anthem for the Atlanta Braves. Since 1998, he has been the national anthem singer for the Miss Tennessee Scholarship Pageant.
Mal has been involved with Miss Tennessee Pageant since 1981 where he serves on the board of directors. He has judged numerous pageants in the Miss America Program including Miss Arkansas, Miss California, Miss Georgia, Miss Mississippi, Miss Missouri, Miss New Hampshire, and Miss U.S. Virgin Islands. He also collects autographed photos of pageant queens and has over 600 in his collection.
Mal teaches the 6th grade at Andrew Jackson Intermediate School in Jackson, Tennessee.
He truly loves J.S.C.C. and can honestly say that J.S.C.C. was his beginning in more ways than one.