I must say that I have several moments that have shaped my life, but the single biggest defining moment for me was as a ninth grader at Stuart Junior High School, in North east Washington DC. During the spring of my ninth grade year my English teacher Ms. Lowery asked if I was ready for some new challenges. Ms Lowery was a middle-age Jewish women that pushed me academically. She secretly secured a slot for me to take the entrance exam at St. Albans High School in Georgetown. I was the only student she approached about the opportunity.
I was so excited about the chance to become a student at such a prestigious school. After class I finished my school day and ran to the bus stop to head back to the southside to let my mother and all my friends know that I was going to St. Albans to take the entrance exam. My mom called all of our relatives and her friends; I walked up and down the neighborhood telling everyone I was going to St. Albans.
My entire neighborhood was aware of the opportunity and they wanted me to show those others kids that "we're just as smart and even smarter than they are." So now I had the entire community on my back, I was no longer representing just myself and my family I was representing the entire neighborhood.
The rest of the week and weekend I was the community big shot because I was the kid from the neighborhood that was going to make it. On the day of the exam, my mom and I caught 3 buses to get to St. Albans. When we arrive at the campus, it was if we were in another world, everything was different, the cars, houses, people, everything was very different from what I was use to.
The counselor greeted us and escorted us to a very large room with about 40 other kids. As I sat and patiently waited I noticed that I was the only African American kid in the room. After a short wait they walked us around campus, they had an indoor pool, huge basketball gym, weight room, everything. I could see myself shooting hoops after school already.
Finally we were taken to the testing room, my mom gave me a hug and kiss and wished me good luck. As I slid into my chair I was beginning to realize that this was not the DC public school system, where I was always the smartest kid in the room. Once the proctor was passed out the test and the pencils issued, it was my chance to prove to all of these "white boys" that we are just as smart as they are.
All of the students were from public schools, many of them from very upscale neighborhoods in northern Virginia and Maryland, places like Reston, Arlington and Potomac.
I started the test and immediately realized that I was way over my head. Some of the questions were so difficult my head started spinning. As I looked around I saw other students briskly going through the questions as if test was an after school extra credit assignments.
I was devastated. The feeling I had, handing the test in to the proctor, still haunts me to this day, 30 years later. I was so distraught after the exam, my mom put us in a cab, instead of taking the three buses back home, which we really could not afford.
The ride home was very long and painful, my mother did everything she could to console me, nothing worked. I felt as if I had let the entire neighborhood down, as well as my family. Everyone knew about me going to St. Albans to take the entrance exam.
When the cab pulled up to my apartment building all of my friends were sitting on the steps of my building waiting on me to arrive so I could tell them how I aced the test and crushed all of them whites boys.
I had to tell them that I had failed and that I was not as smart as those other kids. My mom tried to rush me into the house so that I would not have to answer any of the questions. Not only was I going up there to prove that we are just as smart but it was my friends way of living through me. The school and the surrounding community was so vastly different from what we had all grown up seeing everyday.
I refused my moms shielding and expressed to my friends that I did not do well on the test. My friends were very supportive and encouraged me to try again and told me that I'm still the smartest kid in our neighborhood. So now I'm feeling much better but I now needed to discuss this exam with my English teacher Ms. Lowery.
The exam was on a Saturday, so I played ball all weekend and watched wrestling with my friends and started to move into another set of emotions about the exam, I had become angry with my teacher, for sending me to St. Albans, without properly preparing me to compete against those kids from the suburbs.
So on Monday I walked into my Ms. Lowery's class and ask her to please step into the hallway. She could tell that I was not very happy. I asked her why would set me up, by sending me to St. Albans to compete against those white boys, when she knew I wasn't as smart as they were. She calmed me down and asked me to take a look into the classroom, I peeped my head into the door and the students were goofing around, reading sports magazines and having small talk. I asked why did she want me to look into the classroom? She told me that the kids I met at St. Albans were my competition, that those were the kids I would face when I got out of her class and out of high school, and not the kids in her 9th grade English class. She went on to say that she could not teach me everything I needed to learn to be competitive in the global economy that was coming, at the time I had no clue what the global economy really meant.
She wanted me to see first hand who my competition for the best jobs, best opportunities would be. That experience shaped my life and made me realize that I should never evaluate myself by the comforts of my surroundings and to read, study and work as hard as possible so when my opportunity comes knocking I would be ready. I have lived by that principle, to be as prepared as possible because you'll never know when it's time to take the exam called life.
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