Audio File
Transcript
My name is Calum Brown. I’m 14.
My name is A’mon Rice. I’m 13 years old.
My name is Ross Tedder. I’m 14 years old.
And we interviewed Shad Henderson on August 14th, 2014.
I grew up in Lincoln-Lemington. I was born in ‘79. My childhood was really in the 80s and the 90s, and I would say that in the 80s, everything was great because that’s before like drugs and gangs became real popular in the city. And then in the 90s, that’s when it really hit and you just saw, like, Lincoln-Lemington fell off a cliff. People were dying. Pulse, the swimming pool closed up. The businesses closed up. People moved away. I lost a few friends and family members to gang violence and things like that. And that trauma fueled me to become more involved in the community development. So I wanted to change my community, so I went to school for community development. I went to Pitt and got my undergrad in the liberal arts, went and got my master’s degree in public administration so I could be a leader in my community and try to make it better.
Middle School was tough for me. I don’t know if it was like, you know, puberty, emotions, and stuff like that. I just did not do well in school. Then in high school, I didn’t do well either. I think you know, just negative influence, not going to class. I was totally disinterested in anything school had to offer. I don’t know what it was. By the grace of God, by the time I got into like 11th grade-12th grade I was like “Alright, you have to do something with your life or you’re just going to be on the street not doing anything, not have a job.” So I came to my senses, went to CCAC for two years and I had straight A’s. I became focused. I initially wanted to become a school teacher. I was working at UPS part time and going to undergrad and then I met a professor. He was saying, “Well, maybe you should go into community development more than rather just teaching.”
I still have mentors and role models. Growing up I had a cousin. His name was Chris McKinney. He’s the only one in my family that I knew of that graduated from college. I was like, “Wow. So, I mean, if he can graduate from college, I can graduate from college.” And he was just always even-keeled. He never, like, drank or did drugs or anything. So he was like, a refuge. I was able to go to him, just talked to him. And he always came to my baseball games. He took me to museums and things like that. So I would say he was a big mentor for me.
Believe in yourself. Believe in your ideas, your dreams, and write it down. Get a journal. Write down your hopes and dreams. Write down things that happen throughout your day and review it as much as possible and surround yourself with people who are uplifting, that are positive, that are going to encourage you, and stay away from those people who aren’t. I mean, you have to be able to decipher between constructive criticism and just pure negativity. It could be people in your family, it could be close friends, where they’ll unintentionally discourage you from achieving your dreams. So they could say, “Oh, you want to be a doctor. Ah, you can’t be a doctor. You don’t have the grades for that. You’re not smart enough for that.” Could they just be saying in a joking manner, but don’t let that take hold. Be careful who you share your dreams with. Don’t share them with everybody. Only share them with people that you really trust. Those ideas that come in your brain and anything that excites you, or energizes you, you should believe in that. You got to be disciplined. You got to know your dreams, know your aspirations, write them out. So if you want to go to college, like, “OK, this is the college I want to go to. These are the grades I want to have. This is the amount of money I want to make.” Whatever you dream and believe you can achieve. So dream big. Believe in it and you could achieve it.