00:00My neighborhood school was not known for being the best.
00:03I actually never went to public school.
00:07I never went to a school in my zone district.
00:10I was the token black girl in every school that I attended.
00:14My parents actually moved us from New York to Georgia for better education.
00:19My older sister was probably the only black kid in her entire school.
00:25Hi guys, I'm Abby.
00:26I grew up in Philadelphia, North Philadelphia specifically.
00:30Hey guys, my name is Sojourner and I grew up in West Chester County, New York in a small
00:36town called White Plains.
00:37Hi, I'm Melanie.
00:38I grew up in Atlanta, but I was born in New York.
00:41My parents really didn't have any expectations of me.
00:45From there, I really just went on Yahoo! Education back in the day and found a few schools that
00:52were the top in Philadelphia.
00:53My parents always believed that you always do better for your children than what they
00:56had.
00:57To provide me with better opportunities, better education, to be exposed to different kinds
01:01of people and different kinds of lifestyles, and I can definitely say I was exposed to
01:05a lot.
01:06In eighth grade, I applied to magnet school in Philadelphia and really told my parents the
01:11night before, you need to take me to the school district so I can hand these papers in.
01:14The public school that I went to was one of the best in the county.
01:17One of the teachers that I had at the Christian Love Academy reached out to my mom to let her
01:22know that she thought I would be a great addition to the Hackley community.
01:25Having that resource that was already at Hackley to reinforce that she thought I would do a
01:29good job was the ultimate motivator.
01:30Obviously, neighborhood school would be very, very convenient to get to.
01:34Mine was not.
01:36My mom had to drive me and my brother to school every single day.
01:40The bus took an hour, an hour and a half.
01:43It was actually two buses, or it was a train and a bus.
01:45We had to leave my house by like 6.45, 7 in order for me to get to school on
01:50time.
01:51So I would be leaving the house at about 6.15, 6.30.
01:56So waking up at an hour before, so 5.15, 5.30.
02:00My parents also made sure that me and my sister had tutors to make sure that we were always
02:05on top of our schoolwork.
02:06So they were always putting me in different programs, summer and during the fall, to enhance
02:11my education.
02:11They had an IB program, they had an AP program.
02:14SAT prep, yes, SAT prep from the sixth grade.
02:17My high school had some summer activities for us to come in and just think about college
02:21and the application process.
02:22I knew I wanted to go to a historically black college or university.
02:26I attended school with white kids all my life, so I wanted to be in a space where I was
02:30surrounded
02:30by people who looked at me.
02:32My high school is actually a feeder school for the university that I went to Penn.
02:35Most of the kids that attended my private school ended up attending Ivy League schools.
02:39First day back into senior year, I was in my counselor's office, you know, with her getting
02:44all of my materials together.
02:45My parents were all about education.
02:47They were all about providing my brother and I with the best education possible.
02:51For me, I loved going to public school in Georgia.
02:53I think that it was an amazing education.
02:56I really, you know, took my life and my future into my own hands.
02:59So while it is a mixture of the parents and it is a mixture of the schools, as long as
03:03everybody is aligned and making sure that the education is the best possible, then it
03:08doesn't matter where you go.
03:09But, I'll tell you all about it.
03:10Then, please read your name.
