Debra Gordon is a dynamic and visionary leader, serving as the Founder and CEO of Nexus Investment Consultants. This firm excels in providing top-tier marketing, branding, strategic advisory, and business development services for established institutional financial services firms, non-profits, and small businesses. At the helm, Ms. Gordon oversees comprehensive management, strategic planning, and implementation. Her current portfolio spans diverse sectors, including sports arena development, real estate, private equity, small business development, and non-profits, where she offers invaluable advisory and capital fundraising expertise.

With an impressive 40-year career in the financial services industry, Ms. Gordon is celebrated for her professionalism, unwavering dedication to excellence, and unique insights into the financial markets. Her extensive network, representing over $500 billion in assets under management, is a testament to her ability to build and nurture long-term relationships. She believes in the art of relationship-building, aiming to craft strategies that position her clients and their firms for enduring success.

Ms. Gordon’s groundbreaking journey began as a trailblazer on the Chicago Board of Options Exchange, where she was the first African American woman in that role at Dean Witter Reynolds. Her pioneering spirit continued as she co-founded Melvin Securities, the only African American specialist firm in the country, making markets in over 100 stocks. After transitioning to New York, she held influential sales, trading, and executive positions at leading minority owned investment banking firms on Wall Street. In these roles, she adeptly handled various investment vehicles, including domestic and international corporate equities and bonds, options, and convertibles, serving public and corporate pension funds, Fortune 500 companies, and midtier asset management firms.

A recognized industry influencer, connector, and leader, Ms. Gordon served as Vice President and President of NASP Chicago for nearly a decade. Under her leadership, NASP Chicago collaborated closely with the State of Illinois Pension and Investment Committee to champion legislation promoting the inclusion of MWBE managers and brokers in local public pension funds. She also spearheaded initiatives to provide networking opportunities and trustee education for the local MWBE community.

In addition to her professional achievements, Ms. Gordon is deeply committed to philanthropy. She serves on the Board of Directors of the Westside Health Authority and Cornerstone Recovery Homes and is a founding member and partner of In the Throne Ministries. A proud graduate of DePaul University with a Bachelor of Arts in Marketing, Ms. Gordon has been honored by NASP Chicago as a trailblazer and champion for diversity in financial services.

Courtney Avery is an experienced healthcare strategist and consultant with more than 30 years of experience supporting healthcare organizations. She spent nearly two decades in leadership with the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board (HFSRB), where she served as Board Chair beginning in 2009 and was appointed HFSRB Administrator in 2010.

In this role, Avery helped ensure the high-quality delivery of healthcare services to Illinois residents by regulating the planning, construction, and operation of healthcare facilities statewide. She oversaw the implementation of the Health Facilities Planning Act (ILSC 3960), which established Illinois’ Certificate of Need (CON) program. Her work included the management, approval, and oversight of more than $3 billion in healthcare infrastructure and capital improvement projects across the state. Under her leadership, the Board also addressed issues related to community need, accessibility, and healthcare system financing.

Prior to joining HFSRB in 2004, Avery worked for four years as a legislative analyst for the Illinois Senate Appropriations Committee, where she provided oversight of the Department of Health and Human Services budget.

In 2022, Avery founded ARC Equity Consulting, a public affairs and communications strategy firm dedicated to eliminating health disparities. ARC’s mission is to improve public health through advocacy and strategic communications with stakeholders and policymakers. Through this work, Avery partners with healthcare providers, foundations, sports-related organizations, and retail chains.

Avery currently serves on the Board of Governors for the Institute of Medicine of Chicago, an interdisciplinary nonprofit organization focused on addressing systemic challenges in equitable access to quality healthcare. She also serves on the board of the Hektoen Institute of Medicine, a nonprofit health services and research organization.

She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Health Services Administration from Sangamon State University and her Master of Public Health from the University of Illinois at Springfield. Avery is also an active member of the Illinois Public Health Association.

Dr. Jeff Heddles is an Ashland University (B.A.1998) and National University of Health Sciences (D.C. 2001) graduate.  Jeff started and co-owned a private chiropractic practice in Chicago’s South Loop neighborhood for twenty years before retiring in 2022. As a sports medicine focused practitioner, he’s worked with professional athletes from every major sport as well as elite musical and dance artists.

Dr. Heddles learned about the West Point School of Music while exploring philanthropic opportunities with the D’Addario Foundation.  After seeing Julian and his coaches instruct firsthand, the WPSoM became a focus of Jeff’s philanthropic plan.

As one who was fortunate to have string and band instruction in his small town Ohio elementary school, he’s been motivated to help keep music programs in schools.

In his spare time, Jeff has written and performed with several local rock bands and currently plays with a cover band around Chicago. Outside of his musical and medical background, Dr. Heddles was a 3x All-American in Track and Field (hammer throw) and is heavily involved in the Epidermolysis Bullosa Research Project (a charity focused on healing an awful genetic childhood disease).

Michael Hund joined EBRP as the CEO in 2017. Under his leadership EBRP has accelerated the EB landscape from 2 to over 40 clinical trials and via their award-winning Venture Philanthropy Model helped fund the first FDA approved treatment for EB in 2023, the first ever topical gene therapy. EBRP’s innovative business model has garnered recognition from Harvard Business School, Yale University, MIT, Rolling Stone, and Forbes.

Previously Michael served as the Director of Development for the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation and the $100 million Curing Cancer Now campaign, which led to more than 10 FDA approved treatments and the tripling of patient life expectancy. He also served for over a decade at Paul Newman’s Hole in the Wall Gang Fund, working on behalf of children and families battling life threatening illnesses. He has dedicated his career to transforming healthcare.

Michael received his Masters in Business Administration (MBA) from Yale University, CORe credential from Harvard Business School, and an undergraduate degree in Philosophy from the University of Kansas. He is the recipient of the MIT Solve Horizon Innovation Award, Social Innovations Journal Leadership Award, Top 100 Magazine Innovators, iHeart Media’s CEOs You Should Know, and the Milken Institute’s FasterCures Changemaker & LeadersLink. He lives in Connecticut with his wife Sarah and four daughters.

Michael is a leader in the investment management space, recognized for scaling firms through strategic vision and a strong commitment to diversity. Currently at Haven Global Partners, a diverse-owned international equity firm, he has played a key role in the firm’s growth, helping expand assets under management (AUM) from $165 million to over $1.5 billion in six years.

Michael’s track record reflects consistent success across complex markets and high-growth environments. As a founding employee and Managing Director at Leading Edge Investment Advisors, he helped build the San Francisco-based firm into a $3 billion organization specializing in diverse manager solutions for major institutional investors. As a Consulting Principal at NexTier Companies, LLC, he focused on supporting emerging managers at one of the largest African American-owned investment consultancies. Earlier in his career, he co-founded Trias Capital Management, a fixed-income firm recognized by Pensions & Investments as one of the “Top Ten Fastest Growing Managers Under One Billion” within three years. He also developed a global client base at Mellon Bank Capital Markets and held senior roles at Aon and Northern Trust, where he secured billions in institutional capital.

In addition to his work in investment management, Michael has been involved in private ventures that align capital with purpose. He helped raise funds for The 51 Fund, a private equity vehicle supporting female filmmakers, contributing to the production of Shayda, which received the Best Audience Award at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. His real estate experience includes Chicago infill development and the acquisition and turnaround of a multi-million dollar distressed multi-family portfolio.

Michael is committed to mentorship and community engagement. He serves on the Finance Committee of Woods Fund Chicago, mentors at 1871 Chicago, and advises organizations including 2Flo Ventures and Partners in Equity, which focus on addressing health disparities and expanding access to capital for minority and women entrepreneurs.

He holds a B.S. in Economics from Cornell University, where he was a First Team All-Ivy varsity basketball captain and a member of the Red Key Society and the Sphinx Head Society.

Music is a passion of Clive A. Phinn. As an accomplished musician in his own right, being a board member of West Point School of Music is a humbling experience, as music has opened up his world to endless possibilities and would love to see the same opportunities afforded students in the program.

Having been on the board for the past three years, his passion to serve in whatever capacity he will gladly raise his hand to serve.

For the past 30 years, Clive has been an Insurance Executive for some of the major insurance companies in the world. He is also the managing Partner for CAP Risk Consultants, LLC, a risk management firm.

Having started taking formal music lessons at 10 years old, Clive is an accomplished piano player, and played the Sousaphone in high school and college. He has served as musical director for several churches and choirs, and most recently was the music director of Holy Family Catholic Church.

Clive attended Augustana College majoring in Business Administration and a Minor in Music. Clive also attended the University of Iowa Law school and have received several designations during his professional career.

Clive is thrilled that two of his children were a part of WPSOM and saw first-hand how WSPOM has indelibly left a mark on students who matriculated through the program. I am happy to be a board member and to help in any way I can to help advance students through this wonderful program.

The world is in great need of music education. When student play music, it allows a part of their artistic mind to express itself, which is very important in helping to balance a child intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally.

Carlo Rotella is a writer, journalist, and scholar. His most recent book is The World Is Always Coming to
An End: Pulling Together and Apart in a Chicago Neighborhood (2019)—about South Shore, the
neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago where he grew up in the 1970s. Among the subjects that
recur in his writing are cities and city life, boxing, teaching and learning, blues, country music, crime,
fantasy and science fiction, movies, basketball, landscape, the Rust Belt, children and parents,
neighborhood, apocalyptic doomsayers, Chicago, Boston, how people get good at things, and a great
deal of violent mayhem.

His other books include  Playing in Time: Essays, Profiles, and Other True Stories (2012), Cut Time: An
Education at the Fights (2005), Good with Their Hands: Boxers, Bluesmen, and Other Characters from
the Rust Belt (2004), and October Cities: The Redevelopment of Urban Literature (1998).  With Michael
Ezra, he edited The Bittersweet Science: Fifteen Writers in the Gym, in the Corner, and at Ringside
(2017).

Carlo has been a regular contributor to the New York Times Magazine since 2007, and he has also been
an op-ed columnist for the Boston Globe (2010-2015) and commentator for WGBH FM. His work has
appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, the Washington Post Magazine, the Chicago Tribune, Boston,
DoubleTake, Slate, The Believer, The American Scholar, TriQuarterly, Critical Inquiry, American Quarterly,
the Journal of Urban History, the Journal of Popular Music Studies, and other periodicals. It has also
appeared in numerous anthologies and collections, including The Best American Essays, the Library of
America’s At the Fights: American Writers on Boxing, the U. S. State Department’s My Town: Writers on
American Cities, The Cambridge Companion to Boxing, Our Boston: Writers Celebrate the City They
Love, and Harvard’s A New Literary History of America. He is co-editor and founder of the University of
Chicago Press’s “Chicago Visions and Revisions” book series. Carlo has held Guggenheim, Howard, and
Du Bois fellowships, and U.S. State Department Speaker and Specialist grants to lecture in China and
Bosnia.  He has received the Whiting Writers Award, the L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award, The
American Scholar’s prizes for Best Essay and Best Work by a Younger Writer, and several Barney and
Bernie awards for feature writing from the Boxing Writers Association of America.

Carlo was educated at the University of Chicago Lab School, Wesleyan University, and Yale University.
He is professor of American Studies, English, and journalism at Boston College.

Dr. Brenda Taylor was born in Chicago, IL. The youngest of five children, she was raised in a two-parent home in the Englewood community. She earned all of her academic degrees in Illinois education systems. She attended Loyola University of Chicago earning a Certificate in Dental Hygiene, a BS in Natural Science and a MA in Urban Affairs and Public Policy. Dr. Taylor is also a Licensed and practicing Dentist in the Roseland Community. She is the CEO and Owner of Love Dental, Inc., a private practice Dental office. Love Dental, Inc., is a thriving healthcare entity that has been in existence since September 11, 2010.

In her spare time, Dr. Taylor enjoys attending faith-based services. She is a community partner with Christ Centered Church Ministries, in Oak Lawn, IL. Together they host quarterly outreach prayer, clothing and food donations. She is also a proud member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., Alpha Beta Delta Omega Chapter which does service initiatives across the West and Northwest sides of Chicago.

Dr. Taylor is honored to have been invited to join the Board of West Point School of Music. She is a student of Muzicnet School of Music where she studies the Piano. Dr. Taylor understands the cultural impact music has. Music inspires, heals, and is a unifier across gender, race and age. It is privilege to have this opportunity to use my resources to elevate and support the students.

Rich Breske has provided strategic management and marketing services to both public and private companies for over thirty-five years. He has brought outstanding vision and leadership skills both as a corporate officer and as an independent marketing tactician.

For the past ten years, Rich has provided executive planning and marketing acumen for 21st century companies through Strategic Marketing Management, LLC. Prior to opening his own firm, he served in key management roles at KHS America, Inc., the Conn-Selmer division of Steinway & Sons, Inc., and United Musical Instruments, all worldwide manufacturers and distributors. He served in the management of the SMART Foundation which provided programs and advocacy support for arts education. He has authored several publications focused on the arts and education.

Rich grew up on Chicago’s south side and attended Marist High School, where he was an active member and drum major of the school’s marching band. He attended Elmhurst College, receiving a degree in marketing and music business. His early career included time at the Chicago Symphony and Ravinia Festival organizations, as well as classes at the Chicago-Kent College of Law. Rich has served on several non-profit boards and continues to support music education as a vital component in the development of lives of today’s children.