Mark Dillon, basketball
Mark Dillon is a senior at Frazier High School, a public school in Perryopolis.
So it seemed somewhat odd that he would bring prayer back to the classroom if he had a chance to do so. A few minutes spent interviewing Dillon dispelled the oddness of his statement, however. Dillon, after all, is a 4.2 student who plans to study mechanical engineering at Grove City College.
He is also a basketball player and golfer at Frazier and was selected as the school’s winter sports male representative in the Centennial Chevrolet Scholar/Athlete Spotlight program. The son of Tracey and Mark Dillon of Perryopolis, he has an older sister, 21-year-old Kelsey, who is studying to become a physician’s assistant at Seton Hill University. Kelsey played volleyball, basketball and softball at Frazier.
“I also golf here and was named all-section three years in a row,” Dillon said. “I am a center in basketball. I like banging and blocking. Blocking shots is my favorite thing about playing basketball.”
He is a big reason (he’s 6-4) that the Commodores have high expectations for the season. He is also a very intelligent kid who seems to have his priorities in the right place. Thus, the comment about bringing prayer back to schools.
“In the morning here, it’s a moment of silence,” Dillon said. “It used to be prayer, but it just phased out into a moment of silence. I think that we should phase it back in to where we could read the bible. It used to be like that back in the day. It’s very important and I think that’s why the country has gone the way it has.”
Dillon attends Cherry Tree Alliance Church in Uniontown, plus he goes to Mahaffey Church Camp in Mahaffey, Pa.
His religion helped him choose Grove City, a Christian college. “They offer chapel and you have to have so many chapels every semester. You have to go to 17 total, I think, and they offer 51, so you can go to as many as you want.”
Dillon will know soon whether he has been accepted to Grove City, but his mind is already made up. If accepted, he will go there and might use it as a stepping stone to a career as a patent attorney.
“Mechanical engineering is a very broad field of engineering, one of the broadest,” Dillon said. “I’d like to maybe continue and get my law degree and become a patent attorney. Grove City is first, then I would like to work for a while and have my job pay for law school.”
Maybe somewhere along the way, Dillon will get prayer back in public schools.