Becoming a College Student

I left school for a period, but I found my way back. When I returned, I had accepted something difficult: I could not build my future around the expectation that someone else was eventually going to rescue me.

So I did what I could to remain enrolled and remain on campus. I borrowed money. I worked when I could. I made financial decisions that I would understand much better years later. Some of those decisions—particularly credit-card debt—followed me for a long time.

But I stayed.

I became involved with the student newspaper and student government. I became a familiar face around campus. College was imperfect, sometimes deeply so, but I was participating in something positive and discovering that I could contribute to a community.

Finding My Voice

One of my most memorable experiences came through campus radio. I wanted to be involved, and I believed that a kid from New York might have something to contribute.

One night, I was assigned an 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. shift with almost no music available to me. So I improvised. I turned the program into a talk show.

Was every moment of it professionally advisable? Probably not.

But people listened.

My baritone voice became recognizable enough that students who heard me elsewhere on campus often knew who I was before I introduced myself. For someone who had spent so much of his childhood feeling invisible, there was something powerful about discovering that my voice could make people stop and listen.

That experience stayed with me. Years later, whether speaking in classrooms, addressing students, making music, or advocating for institutional change, I would continue learning how much responsibility comes with having a voice—and how important it is to use it.