Why Not Us?

So I didn't know about college until my junior year, I didn't even know that thing actually existed.

My dad worked in a factory, he cleaned offices at night.

And uh my mother as a janitor.

And they would tell me "See, you don't want to be doing this.

"It's not bad work, but you have the opportunity "to do something else.

Something different."

My mom, uh, I don't think she thought I was gonna leave at first.

Until she saw me packing.

And then, I remember the first day I started packing, "Oh what are you doing?"

"Um...

packing."

"Packing for what?"

"For UCF, I'm going to college, remember?"

So, to her it became real, to me it became real, to my sisters it became real and my little sister cried when I left.

(Jasmine) Say hey to the camera Hi!

(Jasmine) Hey grandma, how're you doing?

In high school, it was like, I did have fun.

I hung out and I went to parties and I did all this but then when I got to college it was like, I was so serious and so "I cannot mess this up."

I go to work, I go to school I do organization stuff and then I'm back home again.

I just can't afford fun right now so I just do what I have to do, pay the bills, get it done, and so... yeah.

Being first gen, I feel like I'm wasting time and I'm wasting money because I haven't declared a major yet.

I feel like, right now, I'm not going to be able to combine my interests to find a job that I love.

So when I found the opportunity to travel across the country with three complete strangers who were also first in their families to go to college, and along the way talk with people who created their own lives, I knew it was something I wanted to do.

[Airport PA arrival announcement] (Felipe) Jenny and Jonathan are arriving right now.

I'm nervous, anxious, excited.

I know they're across the country so they're in states that I've never been in.

Uh... really, really nice people from what appears to me on the phone.

(Felipe) Good to see you, man.

(Jonathan) Ah, good to see you.

(Jonathan) Hey Jenny!

(Felipe) I think that's her.

Is that her?

It is her, it has to be her.

Welcome to California, our first stop.

(Jonathan) Woo!

Fist Gen Roadtrip!

(Felipe) Being first means being first for everything.

Being the first to figure out how you can leverage all of this education, Being first to discover what is a master's program, being the first to travel.

I don't think our story is really unique.

But like what's so different about us, like, that we're able to be on this road trip and a lot of people are not able to be here.

(Jenny) Right, like why us?

(Felipe) Why us?

(Felipe) I don't know what's up ahead but it feels like there's something that it's all leading up to.

(Jenny) We are hiking five miles up a mountain so we can bungee jump off the bridge to nowhere.

(Felipe) We're going to be up at about a hundred feet.

(Guide) How do you feel, you feeling al title bit nervous?

(Jasmine) Yeah.

(Jasmine's mother) Jasmine is like my centerpiece.

I cannot imagine life without her.

(Jasmine) When I go home and I visit, and there's, there's food in there but it's not like I'm eating in Colombia.

In those moments, I'm very doubtful that I'm doing the right thing.

I wonder, do they have water?

Do they have heat?

I'm always thinking like, I could pay this bill so they don't have to worry about it, I can do this for them.

Oh, I have enough this time I can send some home.

I just can't let them suffer and not do anything.

I can't just stand by.

(guide) Trust me, okay?

I wouldn't let you do this if it wasn't safe.

So just look at me in the eyes now, okay?

It's a big jump of faith-- (Jasmine) I can't.

(Guide) You can.

(Jasmine's mother) She's never put herself above anybody else, so it's like, don't you worry about me I'm gonna be alright.

You just worry about you, you be alright.

And I want her to take that back from the trip.

(Guides) 5,4,3,2,1.

[Felipe screaming] (Guide) 5,4,3,2,1 bungee!

[Jenny screaming] (Guides) 3,2,1.

[Jonathan screaming] (Guide) Big papa jump, in 5,4,3,2,1.

[Jasmine screaming] (Jasmine) This was freaking amazing, and I did it.

(Jonathan) My name is Jonathan and I currently attend the University of Central Florida.

I was going to major in bio-med and it was because since I was like in fifth grade everyone knew I was going to become a doctor because that's what I said I wanted to do so everyone backed that decision.

"Oh, he's going to be a doctor, he's going to be a doctor, he's going to be a doctor" Then, uh, this semester I took some time and thought about I don't wanna do it anymore.

I'm kind of interested in something else, and I changed my major to marketing.

And I went home and told everyone about that, and they're like, "What?

You did what?

"You changed to marketing from bio-med, "why would you do that?

I thought you were going to be a doctor."

Um I was doing it because I was trying to make them happy, because this is what I thought they expected of me.

But, I don't know, I still feel like I'm letting people down and that I should maybe go back to, you know, bio-med and in return it would be my service to everybody that has like backed me.

I'm hoping that the people that we interview kind of give us some insight as to how to follow what we want to do.

(Jenny) Oh you're a little close.

(Felipe) We're about to interview Mr. William Allen Young.

He's an actor, humanitarian, director and founder of a nonprofit, "The Young Center."

In high school, he's the one who gave me a sense of direction, a sense of purpose.

Um, and he's really, really, really, really great.

(Felipe) Good to see you.

(William) Yeah, man, good to be seen.

(William) I come from a large family, and we grew up right in the heart of Watts, right here in Los Angeles.

My mother had to drop out of school at an early age, and there were seven of us.

Uh, and she'd work all day long and then she'd come home.

And in our home my mother was such a stickler for a clean house.

So we would have to get down on our knees and we had hardwood floors, and we would line up behind her and we would do the wax-on wax-off approach.

And we would do the, 'Get a good education, 'before you get old cause a good education is better than gold.

'Gold and silver will wash away but that good education will never decay.'

I think that reality hit us a lot earlier.

Um, when I was a kid, I was young but the Watts riots happened.

And I remember just watching our neighborhood on fire.

And it's almost like, not your whole childhood is gone, but a big piece of it.

And once the innocence is gone it's like, welcome to the real world, you know what I mean?

But on those days, I still was expected to get A's.

Going on to college and getting college degrees and advanced degrees, I never stopped and thought about my circumstance being any excuse for why I wasn't supposed to do those things.

And so when I run into young people like you, and I know you and I born with silver spoons in your mouths and yet, here you are and here we are in this journey, all of us deciding, not on my watch.

The line is long with people of all ages who continue to do that.

And you think from your vantage point, from our vantage point, how is that possible?

That's when you realize you are uncommon.

And that is really something you are going to have to grapple with.

Own it, own it.

(Jasmine) As we're going on our trip and as we're still finding out our journeys and figuring out our ways, what is one piece of advice that you think that we could keep with us?

When you were growing up, when I was growing up, there was a world that you belong to that you had very little control over.

You lived in a house, you didn't select your brothers and sisters, you didn't even select your parents.

You didn't select what school you were going to, you didn't even select in most cases what you were gonna wear.

You have to now construct your world.

It must now look like, not what your father's world looked like.

As you create your world, realize you can create whatever world you want.

Which is why you have no excuse later on in life.

Your mommy and daddy are not doing this anymore, this is you.

Create your world and then live in it.

Really take full advantage of it.

This road trip is an advantage you guys are taking, benefit from it, don't just live in it.

(William) Create your world, and embrace the goodness in it.

For that is the place that will prepare you for the rest of your life.

♪ (Jasmine) When we left I was like, 'Yes, we're leaving the city we're leaving the city.'

And when we got to the desert it was like that moment of realization that, we're really doing this.

It's real, it's here, and it starts like right now, you're going.

♪ (Jasmine) This is awesome.

(Jenny) No matter where you look there's canyon around you and you can see, like, the layers.

I'm just thinking about how big everything is in comparison to me and my life.

It's a good way to keep perspective.

Just remembering that my problem is like this big compared to the rest of the world.

And just taking it one step at a time.

(Jenny) My name is Jenny Rogers and I go to Mississippi State University.

I'm undecided right now but I really like math and art.

I know I want to minor in art no matter what I do, what I major in.

I've definitely gone through a lot more than most kids at my age range.

I was born in Georgia and my parents owned a small like appliance business.

I couldn't say I know what happened with that because we moved to Mississippi.

And so, my mom passed.

I was 9.

The financial weight got on my dad's shoulders more and more.

I remember he would just drink like almost all the time, like, he would even get me and my brother in the car with him and drive and eventually it got to the point where my dad got pulled over three times from drunk driving.

He left one morning to go to court and then my uncle came over that afternoon and said, "Alright, uh, I guess you gotta pack your stuff."

(Jenny's aunt) Jennifer, she has a drive, and she wants a better life for herself.

I try really hard to like keep my head up but it gets hard.

(leader) I went to school here at Flagstaff High School and then I went to NAU and I got my Bachelors in forestry and eventually my masters and now I'm the first Navajo woman to get her Colorado River license, guide license, and that's a huge deal in the Grand Canyon.

(Jenny) Would you mind talking about, um, your transition from living on the reservation to high school and then the transition from high school to college?

(Nikki) Well, I can talk easily about it now but it was really hard for me when I entered high school because I got made fun of the way I looked, the way I talked, and that was very, very hard.

My grades plummeted.

And eventually, yeah, I found some friends but I never really recovered from being bullied, should I say.

In college, that was another huge shock because I never did hard drugs or anything but I definitely did drink.

And, um, I'm not hiding it but I'll confess that I'm a recovering alcoholic.

Being in college and keeping up I thought that's what you did.

And being a river guide, where a culture that likes to drink unfortunately.

Because it seems like a party down there to some people and when in fact it's not.

I was also in an accident that lead me to drink even more, and that was the moment that my husband and I said, "Let's stop drinking."

(Felipe) Where did you get the motivation to keep pushing and to keep going, even facing those challenges and facing criticisms?

(Nikki) I think it was deep down inside, I knew there was something out there for me that I needed to take advantage of.

You need to just push yourself and you listen to people who tell you, "You are great, you will be someone someday, "you're going to make a great leader, you will make a difference in someone's life."

Listen to those people.

They don't, we don't say that just because we want to hear ourselves talk.

(Jonathan) You mentioned earlier about being the first Navajo woman to get your Colorado River guide license?

Mhhm.

What does that mean for you, uh, as an individual and I guess for you and your people as a whole?

(Nikki) It's a huge deal to be in this community.

There's still a lot of racism, uh, stereotypes, and also I think my role as a Navajo first generation college student is to tell people like you guys that anything is possible.

Take advantage of every opportunity that can, that, may be presented to you or you may see it from afar and say, "I'm gonna go get that, I'm gonna do it."

It's like a rapid.

If you've ever been on white water in a rapid, in the Grand Canyon, there are several of them like Crystal Rapid, I am deathly afraid of.

I've broken my ore, it's flipped my boat several times, but I've made it out okay.

That is my analogy for life.

Just, just go do it.

(Jasmine) The most powerful moment was when I looked over and she was like hugging Jenny so tight.

(Jenny) I don't think I've ever felt more vulnerable.

I don't have to reflect on my past at home.

it's hard to face.

It's not all up, there are definitely downs, a lot of downs.

We look at them and we see everything that they've gone through, and they're here and they've made it, right?

(Jasmine) I think for us, we always feel like we have to be the strong ones and we have to keep going so we can't think about what's happening.

Right now, I think it's our time to look at our lives and reflect on what had happened and be able to cry if we want to cry.

This is our time to just be human.

(Jenny) Did you see that lightning?

(Felipe and Jenny) Woah!

(Jasmine) It's time to go.

Powerful.

If lightening would hit you now, would you be ready to go?

Oh, Jesus.

(Jenny) Was that one right above us?

(Jenny) Time to go.

(Jenny) Go, go, go, go!

(Felipe) Let's get out of here!

(Felipe) Do you feel more alive, man?

It's amazing!

(Jasmine) We have grown into a family.

(Jenny) Yay!

Felipe won!

I just feel like I bonded and made friends that I would never lose.

(Jonathan) These guys I've gotten to know quicker than friends I've had for 14 years.

(Jenny) We're all basically in one traveling room.

(Jasmine) We're all sleeping in like little beds, and we're like all next to each other all the time.

At the end of the day we may disagree, but we always support each other.

(Felipe) Let's do it.

(Jenny) Felipe.

(Felipe) Tell us what to do.

(Jonathan) Are we ready?

Are we ready?

[all yelling] (Jasmine) It's on my foot and my hand.

(Jenny) We have a leak.

(Jonathan) Oh, that stinks.

(Jasmine) I can't take this.

(Felipe) This wasn't part of the deal (Jenny) Freakin' gross.

Oh my God.

(Jasmine) Where's the thing?

Where's the hose thing?

(Jonathan) I did it last time.

(Felipe) I did it last time.

(Jasmine) I'll do it, I already got it on my hands and feet, I'll do it.

(Jenny) Oh God.

(Jasmine) If you get sick on me... (Jonathan) This is going to scar me for the rest of my life.

(Felipe) We gotta, we gotta burn these now.

(Jonathan) Alright Felipe, are we good?

(Jasmine) They were only a dollar, I can't burn them.

(Jonathan and Jenny) Turn it off turn it off!

(Jenny) Is this still on?

(Jonathan) Felipe, turn it off what are you doing?

(Jasmine) We really tried to turn it off and then Felipe just like smashed the sign, like, (Felipe) I thought we were friends.

(Jenny) I don't want to talk about it.

(Jasmine) I'm in Texas, never thought I'd be in Texas.

(Felipe) We're in the middle of the country, basically in the South.

(Jenny) It's all been happening so fast.

We're like halfway through our trip already.

(Jenny) We have four interviews in Texas that we're nervous but also excited for.

Hi!

(Leader) Hey!

How's it going?

(Roadtrippers) Good, What's up?

I'm in Austin, Texas now but I'm the first person out of four living generations to have left Mississippi.

(Leader) There was a deep calling inside of me.

I couldn't necessarily put my finger on it and exactly what it was, but I just knew I was called to help people.

Why do you think that you didn't just fall into line and stay in Mississippi for a fifth generation or why do you think that you're different?

I've asked myself that a lot.

Um, think about plants, right?

Like, tomatoes can't grow in every climate, you know?

Cactus can't grow in every climate.

I think people are the same way.

Certain people are going to thrive in certain environments and other people are not going to thrive in those same environments.

(Leader) I didn't know that this was my dream and I just sort of very serenipitously fell into it.

but even though I didn't know this was my dream, it feels like a dream because I wake up every morning happy to go to work.

(Felipe) All the leaders their purpose is authentic.

The work that they do is for a reason.

They just listen to their voice within them which is a voice that we're all trying to find on the roadtrip.

(Travis) I don't want to be 70, I don't want to be 80 and all I could talk about is what I should'a did.

I want to be able to sit around and talk about what we did and what was good.

Just do it, just go with it.

(Leader) How's everybody doing?

(Jasmine) Good, how are you?

Well, Jenny, is that right?

Jenny, yes.

Felipe?

Felipe.

Yes, nice to meet you.

Mucho Gusto.

Jasmine.

Jonathan.

Jonathan, good to meet you.

So tell me, where are you in school right now?

Um, I go to, I'm a junior at UCF, University of Central Florida.

That's right, UCF.

And I'm a junior at the University of South Carolina Columbia campus, major in education.

South Carolina.

You talk faster than I listen.

Excuse me, my bad, I'm sorry.

Where are you, Felipe?

I'm an alumni from the University of California, Irvine.

Okay, UC Irvine.

That's right.

I think I saw a picture of you, you had like a Mississippi state shirt on didn't you?

Yeah.

I'm entering my sophomore year at Mississippi State, I'm undecided but I think I want to do something with math and a minor in art.

(Randall) Yeah?

Math and a minor in art?

Yeah.

Yeah, okay.

Well good, good.

It's good meeting you guys.

Thank you.

Did you know that you wanted to basically be a CEO of a company that, when you were our age, did you kind of have like a path of where you knew where you wanted to end up?

Yeah, I had a very explicit path and it worked out exactly like I thought it would.

No, no.

I had absolutely no expectations that I would be a CEO of a big company like AT&T.

In fact, if you'd asked me to guess when I was sitting in your chairs, I would've probably told you I would be running my own company.

My father was a serial entrepreneur and in fact he used to try to get me not to go to college.

So that I could work with him, right?

And so I would've assumed that I was probably going to do the same thing.

So how did you begin your work with AT&T?

I got my job the old fashioned way.

My brother got me on.

Know some people who know some people.

My wife and I decided to get married while I was going to college and she said, "Well, you need to be bringing money in to, not just me."

And so I said, "Alright, I'm going to go get a job."

I talked to my brother who was working for Southwestern Bell and he arranged for me to get an interview and so I took a job working in our computer room.

Doing late night jobs hanging tapes on tape drives.

Fixing programming jobs in the middle of the night.

It was real exciting.

Actually I tell people the programming aspect of it, I look back, it was probably one of the funnest jobs I ever had.

So all of us are first generation college students and some of us are dealing with working two jobs, going to college and dealing with these life changing decisions.

I'm sort of curious what sort of big decisions were you making at our age?

My father was uh in the agriculture business and so I, I started out in college as an animal husbandry major and how to care for and take care of large animals.

Cattle and so forth.

I didn't do very well, to be be quite honest with you my first year.

And I literally took a year out and just worked with my dad.

He told me, "I never had a college education and you know we could work together and I think we can do quite well."

And uh, after a year I said, "No I think that's something I need to do.

And I need to do it for myself and for my family," and so I'm glad I did it.

I don't know that it is for everyone but I think it was the right decision for me.

More than anything I believe what one should try to glean from college and what one should get from college is learning how to think and learning how to think independently.

(Randall) We're all raised and we're all raised with you know, the biases of the communities where we live, and our parents and that is all good but college exposes you to new and different things and I began to take a number of business classes, particularly accounting, it was part of the normal curriculum.

And I found I was quite good at it and fell in love with it and so one thing led to another and I went to business school and I received a master's from the University of Oklahoma but I needed a job.

I had a wife and child while I was going to college and so I started working at a company called Southwestern Bell and while I was going through school and I got a phone call from one of our executives in St. Louis and I'll never forget; He called me after one of these late night shifts, I was sound asleep and he asked, "Hey, could I get you to come see me in St. Louis and let's have a conversation."

And like my question to him was, 'Who's going to pay for the trip, I was broke, alright.

I had no money.

And he said, "If you come up here, I'll pay for the trip."

And so I went up and he talked to me about the opportunities in what was Southwestern Bell at the time.

They just divested from AT&T, they needed professional talent in accounting and finance and those type of areas and he offered me a job and I was really enthused and excited about it.

That's another one of these big decisions.

I made the decision to go to St. Louis and continue working for Southwestern Bell.

Mr. Stephenson, you are the Chairman and CEO of the world's largest telecommunications company, I see that as being very, very successful.

So how would you, personally, how would you define success?

What you just said is very exciting.

It's very fun.

I find the work very satisfying.

But at the end of the day, success, failure, satisfaction from my job, it's about the people side.

About the people interaction.

Whatever you're doing, whether it is cooking dinner this evening for your family, whether it is doing a task as CEO of AT&T, whether it is mowing your lawn on Saturday, seek excellence in every single thing you do.

Establish a pattern, establish a habit of, 'Whatever I take on, whatever I am doing at this instant,' do it with excellence.

Try to achieve perfection.

Don't be crazy about that.

But just have an attitude that, 'I want excellence at everything I do.'

And if you pursue excellence in everything it becomes habitual, alright?

Whatever it is you touch, you touch with an intention of excellence.

And if I have great, as you characterize success, if I have the great fortune of doing these great things with AT&T and in the telecommunications world but my family is not happy or I don't enjoy my time with my family, I don't get to spend time with my family, that is not success in my mind, okay.

Because you are letting down and you are failing at the relationships that are most important to you.

If I am not successful in having and establishing great relationships with the people that I work with day in and day out, then I'm failing.

But at the end of the day, success in my mind is what effect have you had on other people.

(Felipe) Thank you so much, I really appreciate this, take care.

(Jasmine) So we got a call saying oh we might have to go to Seattle, we have Howard Schultz CEO of Starbucks who is like, really ready for an interview like, can ya'll do it are ya'll ready to do it?

(Jonathan) I've never flown on an airplane ever before.

Um, I've always had this fear of flying and um, I realized that planes aren't that bad I mean, just get on a plane and go to sleep, when you wake up you're in a new state.

(Jasmine) When we landed it was just like a culture shock it was like what is this?

Because we went from burning hot heat to cold and rain.

(Jenny) Traveling has been really, really beneficial because not only have I found places that I really love, but I can feel myself being pulled to a different place physically.

(Howard) I grew up in Brooklyn, New York.

I lived in the projects which is federally subsidized housing.

My brother and sister and I saw things that were skewed towards the fracturing of the American Dream and I think it gave us an understanding that we would have to work very hard to not be defined by the station we were in life at that time.

And I'm a product of that.

What was it like uh, going from like, from your high school in Brooklyn to uh, going into college?

What was that transition like?

(Howard) That was 1971.

You guys were not even thought about.

I left Brooklyn, I went to Michigan and uh, I didn't know anybody and I was scared, insecure.

My sophomore year in college, I was donating blood in order to eat.

You remember those things.

(Felipe) As first generation students sometimes we have the sense of uncertainty as to where we're going.

I'm wondering if you had any of those feelings after graduating from college, entering the real world.

(Howard) Well I'd go a step further not only uncertainty but fear.

Fear of failure, fear of the unknown, fear of not making it, fear of disappointing people.

Most people who have achieved great success have had failures.

You want to be the kind of person who is going to overcome adversity and learn from it and overcome the challenges of life because it's not an easy life, it's hard, it's challenging, it's rough.

There's always going to be people who tell you and they told me that what you're aspiring to do or dreaming about or tempting to do can't be done, 'You're aiming too high.'

The greatest strength you have is your convictions and your core purpose about what you want to do and how you want to live and define your life.

And you shouldn't allow anyone, and this may not be politically correct, even your parents to tell you your dreams can't come true.

So what I say to you is when you look in the mirror and you reflect back, ensure the fact that you're proud of the decisions you're making, the kind of person you are.

(Jasmine) When I went skydiving, I was told to leave some stuff in the sky.

Don't bring it down with me.

Leave some stuff in the sky what can I leave in the sky?

What is it that I don't want to bring down with me?

What is it that I can't carry anymore?

When the door opened and I hit the wind, I felt like something hit my chest and it was like, let it go.

I started to scream, I really just started screaming and I felt like as I was screaming, all the screams that nobody heard, all the screams that I felt like were ignored, all the pain that I felt, I felt like it was just drifting out in that scream and I felt this sense of weightlessness.

And I feel like that is the lightest I've ever been in my life.

And when we land, I felt like I landed in a new place.

It was the same field that I had taken off in, but it was in that moment when I decided that I'm going to be different, I'm going to change.

It's not all at once, It's not going to happen just in an instance, but just keep working and just keep growing and just keep trying and just, just don't give up.

(Felipe) Driving down Birmingham, I was thinking about the history behind Birmingham, the civil rights movement.

(Jasmine) Birmingham is like the melting pot of the civil rights movement.

It's where everything got its attention from it was from Alabama and being a history major going into education and going to teach history, what better way to get my information than from the source from someone who sat there.

Ms. Odessa Woolfolk was a civil rights activist and she actually participated in the movement itself that happened in Alabama.

(Odessa) I was a teacher in 1963 when the civil rights movement in Birmingham reached its crescendo.

And several of the students that I taught then went to jail, marched, etc.

Now I'm not all that brave, but everybody doesn't have to be on the front line.

So I ended up being a teacher.

(Guide) You're gonna have 50 unsolved bombings if you talked about voting rights, your house could be bombed.

If you were a person that talked about integrating a local swimming pool, your house would be bombed.

And Birmingham gets this awful nickname and it's gonna go from being the magic city "Birmingham" to "Bombingham" the tragic city.

(Jasmine) Present day when you look across the streets to the park and you see all the different monuments and the statues of what is represented as what happened in the civil rights movement like, how does that make you feel knowing that you were there, you were part of that?

It's spiritual.

Um, it's spiritual and whenever I go through the park and I recollect those individuals and their lives and how important their lives were.

If I'm over there I think about everybody who was a part of that made it possible for you not to have to go through that.

I don't think anybody who has been successful has had a pain-free life because pain is the stem of us.

Embarrassment, falling on your face is a motivator.

You owe it to yourselves to look deep down inside and tap into doing something for somebody other than yourself.

(Jasmine) You like to separate yourself from the past and say this happened but whatever they learned from it we learned from it, we're just going to move forward now but seeing that museum was like, this is real.

This happened.

They didn't know that I was going to be here but yet they fought for me anyway.

Because of what they fought for, I've been given this life it's It just makes you feel so blessed.

(Alejandra) When I was 19 I thought I would take a very easy road, a two year degree, maybe become a secretary because I had an older cousin that was a secretary working in city hall and so that was appealing.

And now seeing the journey in my career having this opportunity as executive director of the White House initiative on educational excellence, I get to work with secretary Arne Duncan and President Obama on how do we ensure that every child has a quality education and for me, right now I'm in my dream job so I don't even know after this, what I would do because I have the opportunity to do outreach and I have the opportunity to work on policy, um, and work with my community.

The more I explored about opportunities and what college would offer me, the more I learned that I could do anything I wanted to if I was equipped with the education degree that would open those doors for me.

There are still times where I'm afraid of the what-ifs but I just know so many doors have been opened to me because of my education and it's that grit and resilience that's really going to get you to achieve your dreams and your goals.

It's going to be tough there will be times where you fall down, but um, your job is not to avoid falling down it's to make sure that each time it happens, that you get up and you move in the only direction that matters and that's forward.

(Jasmine) We're sitting in front of the department of education and um, two people just like walked up and they were like, "Someone saw your RV "so we went and told Mr. Duncan and he wants to interview you guys today."

And we're like, "Yeah."

(Felipe) We'll see if we can squeeze him in.

(Arne) What's going on guys, you living out here?

(Felipe) Yes.

How you doing?

(Jasmine) So did you always know that you were going to end up in education or is that like-- (Arne) I had a pretty unique upbringing I grew up in hyde park in the south side of Chicago which is a middle class integrated neighborhood.

My mother started an inner city tutoring program on the south side of Chicago and literally raised me and my sister and brother from the time we were born as a part of her program.

What we saw every day were kids who had huge challenges at home, in the community, but because they had my mom and other people in their lives they went on to do absolutely amazing things.

This job, I didn't even know existed, but to have an impact first running an after-school program myself, then helping start a small public school on the outside, then working for the Chicago public school then leading them, then coming here, this is what I love.

This is my passion and I didn't necessarily know at your age concretely what that meant, but I knew I wanted to help kids who weren't born with all the advantages that I had but had as much or more potential and sort of, fill that potential with opportunity, meet that potential with real opportunity.

Um, what advice do you have for us moving forward in our life and on the road that we can pass down to others or just keep to ourselves?

(Arne) Well first of all, you guys are just amazing role models and leaders now, like, not future leaders but like, leaders now.

Being the first in your family, not just going to college but completing college.

I absolutely believe you're changing not just your lives but the lives of your children, and your grandchildren and your great grandchildren.

You're changing generations of lives in a profound way that may be even hard for you to comprehend now.

And so you guys living this beyond living on this bus for 5 weeks and traveling the country which is fantastic, the example you set every day is huge.

(Jonathan) Do you mind reading it to us if you could?

(Arne) Yeah, my handwriting is not very good is it?

Thanks for the example of great leadership you give young people and the nation every day.

I'm proud of you guys.

(Felipe) That was cool, man.

That was awesome what just happened.

I'm still getting over the fact that the Secretary of Education wanted to specifically meet with us.

(Felipe) Just talked to us, it was awesome.

(Jasmine) He sat on my bed.

(Felipe) He sat on your bed?

(Jasmine) He sat on my bed.

(Felipe) i didn't see that, let me see that step again.

There you go, that's the motivation step.

(Jasmine) I met Arne Duncan, I met Arne Duncan, (Leader) So I came to this country in high school.

I knew of America from watching TV so I thought all black people in America were like Fresh Prince.

Uncle Phil, yay!

I'm so excited.

And then I though all white families were like Full House.

I'm like, 'Wow, I'm gonna win, this is going to be great.'

And when I arrived, when I say culture shock, it's actually an understatement.

It was just smack in the face.

So for me because I didn't understand the American vernacular I was put in Special Ed and I think that was tough for me because I came from an environment where everyone looked like me and it was easy, I just show up and do my thing.

Freshman year of high school, I looked like a young boy I would go days sometimes without talking to anyone and anyone even talking to me or even noticing I was there to the point where I started isolating myself so instead of going to lunch to the cafeteria, I would go to the bathroom and I would sit up you know, like when you put your feet up on the toilet and I would open my lunch bag really slowly, like in the brown bag, and eat, make sure nobody sees me.

And, let's say you finish, going to the bathroom and you go wash your hands, I would not look up in the mirror.

I was afraid to see the person I was because everyone around me didn't look like me, and they spoke differently, and they were beautiful.

They were like checking their make-up, fixing their hair.

I'm like, let me just wash my hands and get out of here because I thought, like if I looked up in the mirror and I fixed anything they would think, 'She really thinks she's even pretty or beautiful.'

Like, that isolation did so much damage for my self esteem.

It took me years to build that back.

I just did not come into myself until way later in life.

Sometimes, at my school, I feel like I don't belong.

I feel like there's the athletes, then there are the black greeks and there are the white greeks and then there's just like everybody else that's trying to find their way in.

Like, How did you get over that feeling of just not feeling like you belonged in a place?

(Vienna) So, my senior year I was not yet a permanent resident so I couldn't go away to school.

At that time I was young enough to think of it as, 'why me'?

I have worked, I deserve to go away to school.

I deserve an education.

It's the reason why I came to this country.

But I was so busy comparing myself to everybody else's experience, I really was not centered in where I was and then standing and celebrating my journey.

And I wish I had because you miss out on yourself.

I say that a lot, I missed out on myself when I was busy trying to fit in and be like everyone else.

I missed out on my own experience.

So my advice would be don't.

(Jonathan) What was that defining moment when you figured out who you were as a person?

(Vienna) So I launched the Invisibleneighbors.com in September and I was telling a friend, I was like, I wrote this story about my first year in America but I'm afraid to share it.

And, it stopped becoming a shameful thing.

it started becoming an owning thing.

Owning who you are, owning every part of your experience.

When I wrote that story about my first year in America, I thought people were going to get it, people who were immigrants, just... and also had a rough first year.

Nah, I connected with pretty much everyone.

They were like yeah, I can, I can, that's how you're connecting us, by sharing your little personal thing you thought you were alone, we get to relate to that.

When you guys came here and told me your stories, it almost, it brings me to tears because I know what it's like to have an alcoholic parent.

I know what it's like to live without a parent.

I know what it's like to live in poverty.

I know what it's like to have to figure things out on my own.

And feeling isolated in those struggles because we're ashamed to share when we struggle.

Regardless of the struggle you're going through, I can validate that because I'm not the only one, you're not the only one, I'm not the only one, we're all connected in this.

And actually, I like it.

I like the struggle because I think I'm worthy of that struggle.

Everything that I've imagined would be so bad and would break me down has left me right here, in front of you, strong.

(Jenny) It's not like I have this desire to like, meet people and be like, "Oh hey, nice to meet you my name is Jenny.

"I lost my mom when I was ten and my dad is an alcoholic and he's in jail."

But if I trust that person enough and explain how its made me a stronger person so that way, I can help them.

It's definitely a benefit that came out of growing up the way I did.

(Jasmine) I have mixed emotions about the ending of the trip.

I want to go home but I don't want to go home.

I want to stay here but then I'm like, ehh.

Like, I'm ready for my space and freedom but I feel like I'm just going to miss everybody so much.

(Jenny) Like, I've been saying this whole time, I've been telling my friends and stuff back at home, like, I could do roadtrip forever.

I haven't gotten tired of doing interviews, I haven't gotten tired of being around with these people.

I've never been happier.

(Jonathan) New york has always been a place I wanted to go to.

Broadway, Statue of Liberty, museums, I want to do everything in New York.

(Felipe) Immediately you get the sense of the city, you know horns blaring, music playing, then smells.

It was sort of like everything else was training for this.

You made it here, to the end.

(Jasmine) We are about to interview John Legend who is a popular R&B singer, he is a very big humanitarian, and he's just really about making a positive change in the community.

(John) So, at 19 and 20 I was at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

And, uh, I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do, so from ages 20 through 23 I was doing management consulting during the day, and then performing and recording and doing musical things at night.

And so uh, it was a lot going on but my goal was to always be exactly where I am right now.

(Felipe) What kind of road blocks and failures have you had in your life that made you the person that you are now?

And how did you deal with them at the time?

Well there's, there's all kinds of issues that have come up.

You know, one of them was when my parents got divorced.

That was very difficult for me.

Another obstacle was just being a first generation college student.

I was definitely a fish out of water when I first arrived in Philadelphia.

And my parents didn't have all the tools that they needed to give me great advice on how to do that, so you know you have to meet other people and connect with other people that can help you.

Um, you know, there were record labels that turned me down, and people did say no to me but I never felt like any doors were completely closed.

I always looked at it as, 'No, for now and uh, come back later and maybe we'll say yes.'

As a successful recording artist, how would you define success?

(John) Well I think success has a lot to do with finding something you love and putting everything you have into it.

And if you do that, you're going to end up being really good at it because you put so much time and energy into it and you're going to get joy from doing it.

I fell in love with music at a young age.

I loved being on stage, I loved performing in front of a crowd, and so when you love something like that it makes you want to figure out how to do it forever.

(Jasmine) As all being first generation college students, all of us are like on a similar journey, what kind of advice do you think we should live by in our daily lives?

Well I think first of all, don't give up.

To be successful in life you have to be able to get past these obstacles that are in your way.

You have to... you know you're going to struggle with certain things you know, you may have issues paying for college.

Uh, you may have issues not knowing all the skills that you need to know to navigate the situation because you're first generation.

It's going to be harder for you than for other people, but what's going to make successful, is if you, despite these challenges, figure out a way to make it work.

And you can do it.

(Felipe) Being first gen, we're not the first explorers and sometimes it feels like we are, but we're not.

We're the first to do it here.

We're the first to do it now.

The fact that I didn't hear about college until my junior year of high school.

That speaks volumes here about what needs to be done in the community and I was one of the lucky ones.

My next part is mobilizing that first generation community because a lot of people don't have that kind of fortune and I want to be the person who reaches out to them, gives them that hand, so that they do have that ability to say, "I'm one of the lucky ones."

(Jenny) We're interviewing, uh, Anna Maria Chavez, the CEO of girls scouts USA.

(Felipe) And it's really special for us because it's coming down to a close.

This is our last interview of the trip.

I feel, I feel good, I just think it's kind of sad, because I mean since this is the last one that means we'll be splitting up and have to go back home.

So I'm going to miss these guys.

(Anna Maria) So I actually grew up in a very small farm town.

I didn't realize what a different experience I was living until I got to high school.

Um, because we moved to Phoenix, where I was a minority.

And that's when really, sort of the labels came on, like oh, 'Girl at risk,' or 'Girl of color.'

And I was like, well that has nothing to do with my identity.

I'm Anna Maria Chavez.

When I was growing up in Arizona, I happened to be introduced to the girl scouts.

That's when I discovered my passion, around protecting the environment and our infrastructure for future generations, and literally because of that, I decided at the age of 12 I wanted to become an attorney.

And so, I went to our public library, and I talked to the librarian and I said, "How do I do this?

How do I get into law school?"

She's like, "Well it's a very deliberate path.

"You know, you've got to graduate from high school "with good grades, you've got to get into a university, "and then you got to get into law school, and then you got to pass a bar exam."

And that can be pretty daunting at the age of 12, right?

And so, I opened up the books and said, "Okay.

Gotta graduate from high school, I gotta do this."

So, that is why my parents moved us to Phoenix.

Because they wanted me to have a really good experience in high school.

And, um, so that was my path, and it all started because of girl scouts.

(Jenny) So, we would like to know what it was like and where you were at our age range, which is from 19 to 24.

(Anna Maria) 19-24.

At 19, I was at Yale.

Applied honestly because they sent me a brochure in the mail.

And I was so naive, I thought, "Oh, they're sending me a brochure, Yale must want me to go."

This was, you know, the late 80s.

Um, my freshman year I was one of 16 Mexican-American students on campus.

And so, everything was different about me.

You know, I had never seen snow before, I hadn't gone to boarding school, it was my first time away from home, I was so homesick.

There were a lot of obviously driven people around me.

Most of them were valedictorians of their high schools.

So I was constantly like, 'Ok when are they going to find out it was a mistake and pull my admission,' right?

'So I better get this degree now.'

But for me, I had waited so long to get to college that I had a blast.

I just focused and did as much as I could.

How does the work you do today relate to that 12 year old Anna Maria who figured out that this was her purpose in life?

Thank you for that question.

First of all, I can't believe I'm doing this job.

It is the most amazing opportunity.

Every time I wake up I think about how blessed I am, right?

I could literally have gone down a completely different path.

If you had looked back, during the 1960s when I was born in a particular segment of this country, every social indicator, every economic indicator surrounding me pointed me down a different path.

So, 'Why me'?

Why was I allowed to go down this certain path?

Every time I've stepped into a new situation, I'm normally the first of, right?

There hasn't been a long path of people before me to reach back and go, "Ok here's the playbook.

Go for it."

It's gonna get a little scary.

But your only job in life is to stay on that track because you are destined to do great things.

So regardless of what people are throwing at you and what barriers they put in your track, don't worry about it.

Because nobody can change your track.

Only you can.

(Felipe) When we started this trip we asked, 'Why us?'

'Why us?'

And now I'm asking, 'Why not us?'

(Felipe) I'm not squeezing.

Somebody's squeezing (Jenny) After being on this trip, I definitely know that I'm on the right track with my major and my minor because, the fear has definitely calmed down about wasting money or wasting time.

And uh, I feel like after maybe meeting with a counselor a couple times, I can probably declare.

Probably by the end of this semester coming up.

(Jonathan) This road trip was a road to self realization.

Being a bio-med major and trying to become a doctor I felt like I had to do it because everybody expected that from me but, I've realized it's all internal, it's coming from me.

I need to stop putting so much pressure on myself and trying to make what I think is everyone's expectations my priority.

And I need to start thinking of myself The Jonathan I was before this roadtrip And the Jonathan now are like two different extremes Like, the Jonathan before this road trip is still in California.

I left him there.

The Jonathan now is in New York.

This is the one I'm going to take with me back home.

(Felipe) A lot of people are surviving.

Trying to make ends meet 9 to 5.

Then second job, putting food on the table.

And we know all those people, a lot of them come from our background.

Or our families, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers.

But this summer we lived.

We had the opportunity to actually leave all that.

To say, we don't have to work a 9 to 5 today I don't have to go to my internship, I don't have to go work at the hotel.

We didn't have to do that.

We got to really dive into some heavy stuff.

Ask those questions that a lot of people don't have the time to ask because they don't have the luxury to.

This summer we lived.

We lived.

(Jasmine) This summer, I changed my life.

That's what I did.

I traveled, I saw places, I sat in the middle of fears and conquered them.

And I feel like I have worth now.

(Jenny) I hope I can look back on roadtrip and, look back at the end of it and how I feel now, in my own skin and I hope, I hope I never forget that I hope I never lose it.

I want to be able to remember and remind myself how happy I can make myself without anybody else's help.

♪