Be inspired : “I didn’t go to college until I was fifty"-Humans of New York

 

“I was working as a school safety officer when I met her. She was a teacher. But she kept working her way up. She became a principal. She went to work in the central office. She got her doctorate. Eventually she became the highest-ranking black woman in New York education. She was always taking that next step. I was working as a custodian when we got married. She was making five times more than me. It bothered me at first. It took some counseling to convince me that she hadn’t ‘settled’ for me. I’d been raised on the idea that the man was supposed to provide. But

eventually I came around to the idea that money wasn’t the only way to provide. I could support her by doing chores, or taking the kids to school, or picking her up from the airport. Her work benefited all of us, so I could help provide by making her job easier. And eventually she inspired me to want more for myself. She’s the one that convinced me to go back to college.”

 

“I didn’t go to college until I was fifty. I was working as a custodian and it just got tiresome. You could find me in the exact same place, at the exact same time, every single day. Clean the halls, clean the classrooms, clean the bathroom. I wasn’t feeling fulfilled. I started going to college classes on the nights and weekends. It was difficult because I was always tired. There’d be times when I didn’t want to do an assignment or I didn’t want to go to school because it was raining. But my professors kept telling me: ‘You’re not looking for a job anymore. You’re looking for a career.’ I graduated five years ago with my BA. Then 2.5 years later I got my Masters. Now I’m a parent coordinator at the same school where I worked as a custodian. I get to counsel parents about how their children can get the most out of school. My confidence has doubled. I used to be unsure about speaking up, because I didn’t feel qualified to offer my opinion, but now I’ll stop parents on the street-- just to make sure that their child is on the right track. Some people in my position get stressed when they’re given a heavy workload, like: ‘Why do I have to do this?’ I always think: ‘I get to do this.’ I’ve been working in the Department of Education for thirty years, so I could retire next year with benefits. But I don’t want to. Because I love my job. Every day is different.”