Tabora Constantennia and Renee Marchol

00:04 I'm Renee Marshall age 37 today is January 24th, 2015. We are here at in San Francisco. And this is my friend Tabora. My name is Deborah constantina. I'm 41 years old. Today is January 24th, 2015. Where in the San Francisco Public Library and Rene is a friend of mine.

00:32 My first questions for You tab e is we might share a love sports and a love of libraries. And at first when you talk about volleyball in high school sounds like you had a typical high school experience your high school experience is quite a typical. Would you talk more about where you went to HighSchool? I went to high school during the years of 1987 to 1991 in Grosse Pointe, Michigan specifically Grosse Pointe Woods, Michigan there five of them. Okay, the name of my high school was University Liggett school and it was my first years within my first four years with them or my high school years on this school is a pre-k through 12th grade school. So they were many kids who had been there since sometimes preschool. Sometimes fifth grade sometimes sixth grade somewhere in the middle over there. I started there is a high school student. Okay, you were saying what made this a little a typical well all in

01:32 Can high school's hear a lot of things and get plan in mind was no different than that. But one of the things that made this a little interesting is the location university Liggett school is a private independent school. That means it's not related to any religious organizations, but it is one school that you have to pay for. It is also considered a co-educational college preparatory school ranks just below like Andover Exeter boarding schools like that. It is a day school. So you go there in the morning and can't come back in the afternoon like everybody else. It is in the same leagues and we had other people we play sports with where it was more of a boarding school situation, but ours was not so so what made it different from me is even though I had been to public schools that I have been to private schools religious schools. This was the first time I've ever heard of or had been to a school that was both a private independent school things were a little bit different in that regard.

02:32 What made it most different is there very extreme focus on not just education but also for sports they had the whole idea of like the Renaissance person. So they put a very high in this has on academic achievement is well as Sports and also Arts so it was not a place where you were just a jock or just smart kid or just somebody who like drama. This was an opportunity where people could be all free or any of the combinations and it made for some very interesting people had got to meet while I was there. So I really describes you. I find you incredibly interesting and certainly not limited to just one area of study from just are or just science or just math or just we talk more about your occupation and also pair that with something that might surprise you both a sport used to play in high school.

03:32 So my current occupation is as a software engineer. That is my official title Oki my educational background is my highest level of education is a master's degree of electrical engineering sound like mini software on Engineers. We have electrical engineering backgrounds. I've been told by many people especially bosses that they prefer that combination because it's somebody who comes with a tangible Hardware background, which is usually a little harder to obtain mixed in with the software of how all that Hardware Works in gets implemented in industrial life. So so that is my background and that's where I work. I work at a company that makes medical devices. So don't I can't really say do anything very interesting there do a lot of paperwork, but I've been told it's very important because these are things that are regulated by the FDA. So they need to make sure that we're doing everything according to code so we can sell our stuff and nobody dies. So doing my part for the team there.

04:32 And also I don't want people died in that a good thing, especially on the sanctity of Life weekends. So but as for sports one of the nice things about Liggett is it they did provide a lot of sports. I can't say it was very good at any of them necessarily suppose. I could have been if I really tried but I just did it for fun. I had never heard of some of these boys had never seen somebody Sports before and so I tried as much as I could that we could afford to you know by the equipment for himself when I was in high school. I actually played started with volleyball. I actually knew a little bit about that beforehand, but I also branched out into soccer. I did tennis that was a disaster but I tried it was fun. I also played field hockey as well. So I got a nice little range. I would have tried lacrosse, but that one was just like

05:25 What is that? And what do you do with those old Nat Turner sex volleyball game or one particular particular competition between your school and another school and you describe the girls on the other team and the girls aren't here too. So this brings up one of the interesting kind of situations about the school and never did finish that part of it. But this is kind of important Grosse Pointe. I'm for all of those people who don't live in the Greater Detroit metropolitan area is it is a suburb that borders the Detroit metropolitan area. It is on the Eastside of Detroit right next to the water. So if you had a very very good throwing arm, you could probably throw something into Canada. Okay, that is very similar to a very analogous section of the country, which is on like the northern.

06:25 North of Chicago, which they often called the Gold Coast saying ideas same houses. I swear they even have Lakeshore drives. But when I say this is extremely rich part of town. Okay, this is where Henry Ford went after he made his millions building cars in Dearborn. So a lot of people there are not just rich but they're old money folks. In fact, I didn't know this until much later on that on the Fords actually several of them went to our school and donated money to provide some of the buildings there. One of the girls who like me as a matter of fact, her name was Bebe and she was one of the Fords she was very unassuming which is why you know, I didn't know that it in hangout with the folks all the time, but I found out later she wasn't just be before she was one of the Fords. Okay and later on. Like I said, that's my Discover it that you know, they have there were several forward to a donated money to help with the buildings and stuff like that, but it was not necessarily broadcast. They just said it.

07:25 At some point you toward. Oh that one. Okay, very interesting. Okay. So in relation to the volleyball game, this is where this gets kind of interesting. So like I said, this is in the Detroit metropolitan area Detroit has actually a very large ethnic midget pictures, but you don't see it very much when most people think of Detroit they don't think of the very large Islamic community. They don't necessarily think of the very large Asian Community. They think of the black folks who live in Detroit and when you see me, that's what you would think of normal black girl going to anywhere going to Grosse Pointe is quite the opposite. It is predominantly white. There are more Asians there but there are everybody there is very well-off. Okay. I'm so you're there were two very large high schools that are called Grosse Pointe North in Grosse Pointe South predominantly white predominantly, very wealthy and

08:25 West Point has a little bit of a reputation for that. I've heard Grosse Pointe being referenced in many parts of popular culture and it's funny the way it's reference because it's almost like a oblique reference to what's not done. You know, they would wrench in it is he know as it grows in again? It was so slight that you wouldn't notice it unless you've been there and you're like, oh I get this. Okay. We're just like, oh must have been from somebody from Grosse Pointe but they're talking to somebody stress very well, very quiet very conservative and clearly way out of your class. Okay to references just cuz they were so oblique that I just never references when was in a book. Okay. I was called the girl from Harrison High and it was a very oblique reference to she presented herself as somebody who came from Grosse Pointe. Okay, the Grobe being references very quiet very aloof not necessarily stuck up, but clearly you kind of in a rare.

09:25 And are the second one believe it or not was from 21 Jump Street one of the first or second episode. So this came from Johnny Depp was talking to his brand new boss. And at that time Johnny Depp was considered, you know, the very Square by the book rookie recruit on any comes to an after-hours get together with his co-workers dressed in like, you know, Argyle Sweater in a tide, and his boss makes equip items. I call you look like somebody just came out of Grosse Pointe now. I didn't see this particular reference so much later and I don't like it that by the time I got there most people are not wearing Argyle suits like that, but you could tell that that's where it came from, you know, if that was one of those type of fixed. Let's fast-forward 2 volleyball Shelley. So your typical idea of a Grosse Pointe school is pretty much all white pretty much a bunch of little Rich Kidz Bop being around but kind of in a sophisticated way it's even

10:25 Even with that there's like a certain thing of what you don't do. When what you do? It's like the way you present yourself much quieter. It's not nouveau-riche. It's more like

10:36 Unsophisticated with people that do things that way I remember even having hearing people have conversations of this is the 80s and the 90s big hair was real popular for most of the schools back to just take a look at a nice show in the 80s. You'll see people's hair green 06 1/2 in. That was actually frowned on and looked out on where we were with this like those girls with the big are my goodness. Just so tacky know. It's just one of those things. Yes. We are in Grosse Pointe now.

11:09 Are high school wasn't like that though. Okay. I told you what it is like but it was not your typical e, you know, it was predominantly white, but we had a very large make sure of everything they're on the

11:23 Are administrators and the admissions officers actually told us in kind of coded words that they worked hard to increase the diversity there. They wanted this to can reflect the community as best. They could so still while it's still predominately white you'd I would say there was probably about twenty percent African-American. The kids are starting about the year that I came there was a lot of Asian kids. They're not everybody. It's a very small school but compared to what you would see in the much larger public schools nearby. It was quite the first this brings us to our volleyball game. Now that you know the background I play volleyball again. I was at the greatest volleyball played in a while, but I played I was on the JV team at the time and two other players, they needed some substitutes essentially. I was one of the better JV players so they asked me and another girl if we could come and you know Assist them as they're playing in a tournament of other Detroit area schools, they were about 10 School.

12:23 Who's there? I'm eight of them were from Detroit and like and I won't even say that much may be about

12:30 Two of them were from Detroit and the rest of them were from the suburbs surrounding.

12:36 This is like I said, it was a type of school that gave you a lot of homework didn't give you a hard time for self-reflection. You were caught up with all the stuff that every high school student happened to you. Are you going to get decent grades? How are you going to get to get your volleyball practice in you know, you have a product to sew it. Sometimes you don't really pay attention to the Dynamics of the school until you can see it from a different perspective when we went into this tournament on like I said, most of the teams there were from the suburbs and we had these two that was from Detroit teams, but it became very immediately obvious which schools for which okay the to Detroit schools are there teams were in tirely black there was no exception and you didn't even have to ask you wouldn't be wanted to is like, okay your ear your Southfield right now, they were from Detroit. Okay, all the Suburban teams were almost exclusively white. Okay. I think I may have spotted one Asian girl there and one

13:36 Girl was a very light skinned black girl who was on one of the teams that that's it. And there were about seven or eight others Suburban teams. Now, I thought it was just me, but I looked at on my teammates as we're all looking around because we were the only two first-team there we had in our most of the girls. Who were they were white or probably about 10 12 of us, but we had one or two Asian girls. Who were there there were two or three now actually. Three or four black girls around the team and it was just like you look are the teams and we look at each other and nobody says anything but we have this look of like that's how I didn't realize I was such a big difference and I think that was the first time where it hit me that you know for all the stuff people like to say about Grosse Pointe and and well that is very true in certain parts of our school was a little bit too sheltered from that. This is a place where you know even going to a place like that. We all can see the difference and it was very dramatic even with

14:36 Edwards everybody looks around core.

14:39 Interesting. I love the way you put that even without words. There's something that's understood High School itself and just navigating through Social Circles and just growing up and having crushes and having difficulties teachers. All of that is going on during High School. Could you talk more about

15:02 A glimpse of what it was like I was going through social choices in your mind during a typical lunch to hang out with what to eat say. So this is where you get to see more of the actual high schools. Which is very similar to everybody else. Our school was very heavily centered around academics. This is the first school that I went to where we started getting homework on like day one. Okay 90 what wasn't like a whole lot of homework, but it was enough for you actually started reading and you better take it seriously type it in another kind of interesting thing that I had not noticed before. This is the first time I was in this particular system is that our homework was not greeted for the most part. We were given assignments and guess you had better take them very seriously. They would often take quite a long time to do whether it was math or English or history or whatever you had certain assignments that you had to complete you, but you were not graded.

16:02 And your work you would go to the class and they would check your work. We would go through it. We would talk about it. And this is another thing that would kind of distinguished Liggett from all the rest of the schools. I went to the classes were very small. I think the largest class I ever had a pad like 21 kids in there and that was considered a large class and they seriously thought about maybe this is too big. Maybe we should break this up. I had been to the public schools before I went to Leggett. I went to visit again just so I can get some perspective typical classes were 30 to 40 kids in the class. And so it kind of made me crack up when we had our physics class in like stupid in physics. What are we going to do? But I had my smallest class was about eight people. So it's usually between like 8 and 15 people in the class so that gave us a lot of time with the teacher could spend a lot of time instructing kids would typically a little quieter than some of the schools I've been to so they would actually have to pay attention and again for homework that didn't get graded people had to take this seriously.

17:02 Because even though your homework didn't get graded your test definitely were and if you didn't understand what was going on in the homework, you would be totally lost because of tests came directly from you know, that whatever the homework was. So this is why was a really important to pay attention. Another thing was kind of interesting about that is we had our you know, I guess it was every six weeks. We'd have our review and the teachers were right great detail like a good paragraph or two about how the student was doing in any particular class and it was actually kind of fun to read is they can tell you you know, what they thought of Steven my most memorable what was in senior year. I took I'll just sorry that the what is that thing called? Calculus AP? Okay calculus APA be so that's the first level of calculus and

17:56 The teacher I had was good. It was. Very. Well, he says I will only ever give you eight problems at night. I had heard this the same guy was my geometry teacher two years before and I remember hearing this is geometry class a team. That's not so bad. We can't weigh more than that are geometry class. He says, yes, but it's the 8th problem that I pick that doesn't mean you're going to do any left work. It just means you only have eight of them. He was right. So calculus was actually a lot of flooding but like everything else you have to take some time to try to figure out how to get this to work and make sure your understanding everything and so for like the first 6 weeks I got probably more bees on some of the quizzes and tests than days on this one, but I figure you know, it's all in good time. I'll get this back up and going just like I said, this teacher had had me before as a student and he put something on there. I thought was kind of interesting things that you do very good work as a b student and I remember thinking to myself I am not be stupid. How dare he do that? Okay, I got bees but that's a whole lot different in.

18:56 And I told my mother that says I think he did that on purpose. Remember he's had you before and he knows you're not to be stupid that I can mention that the last time he was in class. So I think he said that just to stir you up till you would not rest on your laurels City might be right. So I made sure you didn't ever have put that on my reports anymore. That was the last time I got a B student on anything but at the same time that's also reflects how the teachers interacted. They took their job. Seriously, they liked teaching they really liked it that people wanted to know about what was going on. If you ask them questions to be prepared for an answer because they would be prepared to give you one and they enjoyed this another very memorable thing I had with the academics was and freaked out of this is fun. So for the first six weeks I was lost. Okay, and this is a first for me because I never lost in my homework at least not in high school. I wasn't but pre-cal it wasn't just the beginnings of calculus. They started moving stuff by induction of why

19:56 Play one plus one equals 2y equals means equal then why all of this works the way it is and I remember there was literal Greek being thrown around in class. And I remember going I have no idea what they're talking about. Okay. Now all the kids I went to school with were very intelligent some of them even more. So in the four C's of the ones who are Ann and honors pre-calc class with me and this was intimidating, but you know, you're figuring okay at some point the looking of the fog will lift the light will come on and everything will become clear and after about four or five weeks. I'm like, I know there's a test coming and I am not prepared for it cuz I have no idea what this guy's talking about it so I decided to in the agony and go to the teacher then like

20:43 Mr. Work, I'm lost. He says okay. Let's talk. I says I don't even know where to start. I am. So lost that over here. And now he says okay, why don't I suggest something and we'll go from there. So we work for probably about an hour. And by the time we were through I at least had the beginnings of an outline of how this work. I'm looking at Renee's face right here and she has this relief look on there, which is exactly how I felt that's perfect description because it went from Total mud & Chaos 2. Okay. I can see the light of logic and how to follow this out of here and I did much better. And again remember they're not graded. So which this is one of those cases where it was a good thing. It wasn't great it because it took me a while to understand it. But once I did I could probably now do this and explain it to other people text, but I have four other people and I want to get done with the class. I'm like, okay, thank you so much. You have no idea how big a help that was. He says you don't pour your very good student and if you're not exactly know if you're not understanding it might

21:43 Because I'm not explaining it very well. I like I I don't think so everybody in the add class. They seem fine with that. I don't see anybody looking around and Confused in his you know flabbergast is I am I think it's probably just me is like, I don't think so. Okay. In fact, I'll tell you what next time you have a question about this during our class just asking in class and I bet you I'm telling you right now. I'm if you're confused. I'm betting it a lot of other people in school is also confused as well if you say so and I'll write so but this is we'll get to that in a second.

22:18 I decided to do this so our next class he brought up something now. This is something related to what we talked about before but I needed clarification. So I decide to take him up on his offer. And I said hi. And what does that mean again? Could you explain that better suits? Certainly? I will and he starts writing on the board. I notice every everything got a dead silent. Everybody start writing notes like crazy and I remember working around because at this point I pretty much understood. I just needed clarification, but those people were writing like that. They were go back to save their lives, but we ended up on that paper. I don't like wow, maybe he was right, but it also showed me that Adam sometimes things are not always as you see one of the things about high school, if people learn how to put on a very good face in front of others and just the fact that everybody paid that much attention to what was going on it meant that the teachers write more people needed to know then, you know, I had The Bravery to ask him, but everybody by me asking he said you'll be helping everybody else because they probably want another

23:18 The answers you did have never forgotten that one. So I've got to tell that to somebody else one time. One other thing. I thought was very good as like I said, I had really good teacher died a few bad ones, but most of them were very good and I'm very thankful that they paid attention to the students. I mean honestly paid attention to the students and they tried to help them along the best. They could one small one and one big one for you my senior year. Yes. I am just this big of a nerd. I had plotted out all my classes starting the summer before my freshman year of everything that I was going to take cuz I was so excited about going to sound like a dream come true. So I had looked at all the scheduled classes and stuff and I literally picked out how I wanted my schedule ago looked at all my requirements what had to happen. I had it set I haven't did a wrinkle that happened junior year and it had to do with the way the classes were scheduled. Okay, while technically I could have taken those classes, but due to some very bad scheduling.

24:18 I should explain that even though they lick it was a preparatory schools. And even the normal glasses could be rigorous under even just normal circumstances. We had what's called like the honors tract and the regular track. Okay, when I started at the school as I was this is my first time around I was put in the regular track, but at certain points, I didn't stay in most of the regular track, but for some kids it's like, you know, they were never in the Regular Pack all their kids all their classes from as soon as possible were in honors track for some kids. They never got into that extract all those classes. I took were always on the regular track a little bit of a hybrid because by about

25:01 Sophomore year all my math and science classes wrong honors track, but still like my English classes in my history classes were a regular track in its cuz I really, you know, writing essays where is new to me and you know, I still got he's eventually but it's took a while. I got more bees in English than anything else. I was you know, I didn't feel that that was going to be at the level that I could do with everything else was doing cuz School kept me quite busy. So I was one of the few kids who had both honors and regular classes at the same time because they're tended to be that dichotomy of the honors crack in the regular track when they scheduled classes. They pretty much figure that all the kids in the honors classes will be taking these classes in all the kids were in the regular taxes will be taking other classes. They had no Provisions for people like me. So let's bring us two senior year I at this point was taking honors French honors.

26:01 6 / actually was AP Physics at coming year be taking AP Calculus. I wanted to take AP French. I've been looking forward to this. I am not joking sent before like eighth-grade in does a great. Okay, cuz I just bought learning a language was the coolest thing and I could do it in a p that much better. Okay. I didn't want to take a peek English and English was enough by itself. And I figured if he was just gilding the Lily. Okay, I appreciate those who could do that. I was not in the mood at that moment. Okay calculus on the other hand was a different story. But in order for me to take AP French, I would also have to take AP European History which had a huge and horrible reputation. I saw somebody talking about this a few years ago and evidently things have not changed just because of the nature of stuff. You have to know how you have to know. It had to write lots of essays about obscure European fax. This was considered a very difficult class. I am at a fan of History. I'm much more now that I don't have to get gray hair on its butt.

27:01 Because of that I figured there will be no AP History in my future but because of that and because of my half honors half normal schedule by the time I got to senior year between Junior and Senior year. I would have to skip a history class and my junior year because again because I was on that hybrid schedule the class I needed which was just normal US History wasn't available. Okay at work at Morecambe it conflicted with one of my AP math classes, which I definitely will not be no giving up so I can only take that senior year. Okay, but if I had to take his senior year I couldn't take French.

27:39 My French teacher actually came up to me. She's listening. You're not taking her and she was waiting.

27:47 You know. But the point was is a teacher told me she was I'm the one going to be teaching that she had been my friend Street teacher fridge honors 3 teacher the year before she was looking forward for me to be in the class. Like I was so disappointed them. Like if there were any other way to do it. Honestly, I would have taken it but just the fact that she was paying attention that she was willing for me. Literally, you know, but I couldn't do it because of the way my schedule was and I think it was probably at least one other person who had kind of the same problem. I had here's another small one or this is the big one one of the reasons I ended up on sort of that on his track at all is because my teachers, okay. I like I said it already is an intimidation League regular school and it is so I figured let's start low and if I can go higher will just do that. But let's just see how this is my first time here at all. So let's just get the feel of Atlanta land and then we can go and proceed from there. So I took all normal class.

28:47 Is freshman year and sophomore years when I started to take my first daughter's classes to the first when I knew I was taking this bio, okay.

28:56 I wanted to take calculus. I knew that already by the time I graduated. So in order to do that, you have to take a start off by by sophomore year. You have to start taking what it's called algebra 2 Regents. Some places is pre precalculus for us precalculus really was precalculus is everything but calculus. Basically Auntie calculus is our precalculus the stuff that people call after I've actually to turn a few people here and I'm California for. Calculus there precalculus is more of like Advanced algebra. Okay, and we call that algebra to where we were from so matrices and you know different functions that you haven't seen before in other things to do with this and oh and analyzing functions just a bit of an interesting dichotomy right there.

29:46 I knew I was going to do this but I had to make a decision between whether to do a p or just normal regular everyday calculus. Okay, so I said okay again being cautious and conservative. Let's just start off with a normal stuff. We'll take it from there. So I went to my first day of normal out pre-algebra or sorry. I'll give it to you and it turned out that the honors Algebra 2 you and the normal Algebra Tea were taking place at exactly the same time. So when I came into the class for my normal Algebra 2 class, my teacher says, oh, you know me and our teachers me and the other for two teachers were talking and your other teachers is well, this means that folks have been talking about me. Okay, and we've decided that you really don't belong in this class. We're putting you in the algebra 2 honors class. So just take your stuff go right next door.

30:36 You know, I was scared cuz I knew the kids in this class. This was like the smart group cuz they were the owners track kids that had been telling you about before. You'll be fine. We've already had this discussion. Okay. We've talked about it, and we've decided you need to go to the other class. So it's been nice talking to you. Wish you could have stayed, but you belong in the other class. See you later.

30:59 Now like I said after I got done being scared it occurred to me that you know, Dan sat down and talked about this because you know, you have to get recommended to honors classes. If you're not already in that track, which means that they must have talked to you my classic my Freshman School folks in the people who will be in the honors class and they decided you know, tomorrow is really on the strip lights to put around their okay. I don't know the discussion. Maybe it was something very quick. But just the fact that they were willing to do that and think about that. And again, they had small classes they knew their kids personally. So but just the fact that they were willing to do that and you know, I stole yeah, I realize I still feel like a little kid in the candy shop, but they really thought I was worth doing this. They thought I could handle this. So I figured okay if they think I can maybe I can

31:46 The way you describe this. I understand why you answer the question arises from an academic perspective and and the teacher's influence was with each choice in each discussion to the teachers. Have they put you in contact with other students may be in the regular tracker honors track on so it makes sense to me why you answer from academic standpoint. I'm the girl that you describe demonstration wanted was also to encourage diversity and inclusion. Could you describe what it was like on the ground with the actual students just how students might choose to include or exclude?

32:26 Okay, I will do my best in our limited amount of time. That was interesting. OK the administration really tried and you could tell they really tried so to sum this up best. I'm going to tell you a story of something that happened to let you know how this really did so we were all there but as normal humans are just because you're there doesn't mean everybody gets along the way everybody plans. Now, we never really had any major fights but we had some incidents that were rather interesting. Okay, we had in our area place called the comments of that which I thought was the coolest thing ever. Okay, we had actual furniture at schools, like couches and stuff from that one store that used to sell the hard, you know wood base furniture that was made to take a beatin. Basically. We had this in our school and it was designed so we could wander around and do homework in socialized quietly around the office area, There was the part that was in the open which is right by the office and then you had a Commons which was like a little room is kind of like a den.

33:26 I'm in inside at certain points. They put you know, Beverages and stuff. It was kind of a quiet place. If you needed to have a louder discussion, you could close the door on this one. It was means that everybody could socialize around there, but they're became certain point where all the black kids hate hung up that mess that was like their designated area. OK the administration was flabbergasted. They didn't know what to do about it. It was one of those situations where you can't just say you can't go there because and you look like a bunch of racist, but at the same time they wanted to encourage diversity in this was clear We Go Again Supply. Now there were lots of interesting explanations and whatnot that was gaming to this but when it came down to it is the black kids wanted to be there. Okay, and it wasn't that they kick people out or that they were mean to anybody or anything else but was like all the black kids hung out there and very few other people would go away and if he just became like for the blankets are kids who thought they were being brave and it would come in.

34:26 Timothy Burke the light and everything but it was just sort of like what do we do about this? I mean, we're trying to encourage an area of diversity. And again, we don't want to say you can't do that. But what do you do? So that was like an issue that happened. So we tried different methods and the that became an issue for the entire time that I was at the school one of the ways they tried to quietly diversify the commons was they put coffee and hot cocoa and therefore free and they said okay. We were limiting the commons to be accessed only by the upper school students because we have coffee and cocoa in there and we don't want the Lord kids to get out of hand with their sugar intake.

35:08 It was a nice Ploy it didn't work, but it was a nice boy. So, you know, they're like fine. So all the upper school black kids with their in and they invited the fridge no and it became like an issue for me because you know, I understood by this point some of the racial divide that was going on here, but I was kind of a blissful 1980s kind of kids thinking we're over this now or we know we clearly are not over this and how do you decide where you fall? How do you

35:41 Be kind and compassionate and a Godly person and yet recognized, you know stuff that's still going on now mind you the stuff wasn't going on in our school for the most part for the most part people were just fairly I there was no real racial incidents in our school except for things like this were it was almost like, you know, I don't know if you would call it people didn't want to let go or it wasn't just say you don't want to forget it was almost like we would like to protect your faith this because we feel more comfortable here and that became an issue that from the time I started the time I graduate was always an issue at our school is how do you deal with that? Do you take sides? If you try to stay neutral students took a variety of things one of the things that are School tried to recruit, you know very much from the inner city in the best kids. They could from any of the schools. They would make an effort actually at a scholarship fund specifically for kids who are coming out of the inner city, but showed promised that they would come

36:41 I didn't get that scholarship, but they and so they felt most comfortable in that environment some of the other kids black and white there like they were fine go on either side. So sometimes he would go directly to the comments and sometimes I would spend time with her friends. So they became very interesting to see how people navigated racial. I'm not sure to call it into that. It was definitely a Chasm but it was how do you operate in a world of post Civil Rights Movement America during the 1980s?

37:14 Well said and it's always I feel when we talk it always ends with a cliffhanger. There's so many things I want to know, but thank you again for coming here and sharing your story.

37:27 Are there is there a question that you wish I asked that I didn't I always like that cuz I always like to ask that as well.

37:41 You asked a lot about you know, my personal experience. Like I said in a lot of ways it was very similar to a lot of different ways that I hear about high school all over the place and it's very similar to you know, a lot of people high school experience. It was the eighties is the US, you know, there's a lot of things are going to be the same no matter what it's like going to KMart no matter what Kmart you go to you still have you know, what the bright lights the shelves in the blue light specials for the most part. Okay about some of the distinctive in there and I tried to give you the best I could some of the things that made this a little bit different you see here's a question. I'm going to answer it for you. So, you know, when you go to prep schools like this one of the questions I have heard from other people's like is it worth it? You know, you spend all this money to educate your kids. How does that work in the real world? So I'm going to give you kind of the answer to that from what my perspective is real world is always not what you expected.

38:41 Just because life changes course so many times. It's kind of funny.

38:46 I think it was good in a lot of different ways because sometimes especially during that time there was a point where I needed to know that I can do things on my own. I was still unsure about my abilities of stuff people like to call me smart. I'm not sure if I completely agree with that particular definition. I have certain abilities as anybody else does the question is is can I really use these abilities the way I think I can that was one of the reasons I wanted to go to this school. I wanted to know could I really could I do AP Calculus and not have a heart attack. I love you. I actually tutored my first person in AP Calculus last couple years ago. And this is fun. Yes, it can be done. I could teach it to anybody pretty much even folks were not that great at math because it's a way of thinking that just a bunch of numbers. That was fun. I wish I could say it made me a rich prosperous person. I make $1000000 a year, but it didn't do that. But it did I think that was the first time where you get to see other people besides your parents my mother love me very much by the way.

39:46 But you know, she's buying stuff her kid, but she loves me. It was nice to see other people who said you know, what we believe in you two, we've never met you before but we can see what you've done so far and you're worth arrest for us your worth as taking time. It was nice to see that because not everybody thinks that way I ended up going to another school for college and there's was like, you can't answer your money. Good luck. Now that was a very different thing. It was a you know, it wasn't even so much would Justin it wasn't that I knew at that point that I could do it, but now you get to see it in a way that was just it was completely different atmosphere and why you had access you could ask questions people didn't look down if you were asking questions and wanting more information College was a very different situation where you know, if you ask questions, you're stupid. Now you should have known this before you should be asking the stupid stuff like this. Okay, and I'm thinking I went to one of the best schools in

40:46 Okay, we were encouraged that we were actually at the Circle tag rated from which we participated and now all of a sudden I can't ask you a question how much money am I paying you a year?

40:57 It was a very different thing because it was such a nurturing environment. It didn't prepare me for that. I'm not sure and I think about if I had a gun to a harder school where I had to work harder and actually had to make my own way would have been better prepared for a situation like that and I have to go back and forth on this one and one respect may be okay, but sometimes you have to deal with the person before you build up like the stuff around the person I needed to know I could do this. Okay. So even going to a school like that in a very different an alien environment there was a certain point where I had to say because of everything I had before like I can do this and I will do this. I may not do it the way you want it done but I can do this and I will do this and I will get through even this so and that regard it prove it prepared me mentally even though

41:49 Nothing could prepare me for that without knowing ahead of time. So

41:56 Any last remarks?

42:03 I don't think so, but we could take it offline and have a conversation for ice cream.

42:15 Thank you so much, Daddy.

42:18 Thank you so much Renee.