Most students at Mount Carmel speak one language and might be studying another. Some students are bilingual, but none are likely to speak five languages.
Well, that was until junior Claude Mpouma arrived on campus in early December.
“Puma,” as his friends and teammates call him, has had one of the most unique upbringings out of anyone in the school. He has only lived in America for three years but since then, he has made a huge impact in athletics and gained the attention of dozens of football powerhouse schools. Most importantly, he is a good student with a great personality. He is also hard to miss in the hallway with his 6’8”, 290 lb. presence.
Mpouma’s story began over 6,000 miles from 64th and Dante in the African country of Cameroon. He was born and raised in Douala, which is the largest city in the country. Life was very different from Chicago, but he enjoyed it.
“I had a lot of fun running around with my cousins and friends,” Mpouma says. “Many people were outside every day having fun. It was good.”
While many Cameroonian families have been hit with economic hardships, he made the best of his childhood by dedicating his days to playing sports.
“I was a soccer player at first,” he says. “I played soccer my whole life growing up, then my mom decided for me to switch to basketball because she thought I was too big for soccer.”
His family also started his foundation of strong academics, including learning five languages. He fluently speaks French, English, and his native Cameroonian language, Basaa. Claude also speaks some Mandarin and is currently learning Spanish at MC.
It was not until the summer before his freshman year that he moved to America, initially attending Culver Academy in Indiana. The change was not that much of an issue for him.
“I was not too surprised,” he says. “I didn’t really like the cold at first, and I remember my first time seeing snow. It was weird, but it was great.”
Mpouma moved in with a family friend in Indiana who has legal guardianship over him. He considers her like a second mother and has been living with her ever since he moved to America.
Last year, he left Culver Academy for Phillips Academy in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago. Ironically, this was the first time Claude ever touched a football. Due to the good footwork he picked up from soccer and basketball, he was able to dominate on the offensive line during the season. After just a couple of games, he received his first Division-1 offer to play football.
“I thought, ‘What’s happening right now?’” he says. “I just played two games, and it didn’t make sense to me.”
Since then, Mpouma has earned football offers from juggernauts like Penn State, Notre Dame, and Michigan.
So, in early December of last year, Mpouma made the decision to join the Caravan. One of the first people he met at the school was head basketball coach Phil Segroves.
“He was a great communicator,” Coach Segroves says. “When you meet young men from different schools who are thinking about transferring in, they’re shy or bashful, whereas Claude was very well-spoken and knew what he wanted to do.”
Most students and faculty knew that he was a football star, but they soon found out about his talents in the classroom on his first day.
“[My Honors Algebra 2/Trigonometry class was] doing a very difficult section on rational functions,” says Mrs. Jennifer Smola, Chair of the Math Department. “[The kids were doing a problem], and they were all wrong. That’s when Claude, being quiet in the back, went through the whole problem while the whole class just watched. He’s a very smart kid.”
His teachers have all been pleased with his academic performance.
“He’s very determined in class,” Mrs. Smola says. “He wants to do the work, and he does put a lot of value on academics.”
Since he has stepped foot in the school, he has become friends with nearly everyone he meets due to his energetic personality.
“My first impression of Puma was that he’s huge and a big goofy guy,” senior basketball player Dylan Fulbright says. “I heard a lot about him from some of my friends, and they said he was a big ball of energy and a big joy to be around, so I knew about that already. Before every game, he is always dancing and bringing joy to everyone. He just is himself, no matter what is happening.”
Fulbright drives Mpouma to and from school every day, and the two have become close friends as a result.
In the past few weeks, he has made a big impact on the basketball team’s regular season success, especially in their recent win over rival Brother Rice on February 14. While his athletic abilities will be highlighted most over the next year and a half at MC, it will be his good-natured spirit that leaves a lasting impact on the school community.
“Puma is a hard-working, energetic, and great guy,” Fulbright says. “He’s just a good person to be around.”
