- I think luck's a huge part of success.
- Luck does not play a part at all.
Don't you dare try to make me feel
bad about what I have accomplished in life.
- I was voted Most Likely to Succeed in high school
in the year 2014.
- In 2003.
- In 1994.
- I always had my homework done on time.
I worked harder than the other students around me.
- Editor-in-chief of the school newspaper.
I was president of the National Honors Society.
- So I had to learn English
at the same time of doing my studies.
I took extra morning courses, take-home courses,
and I wanted to finish within three years, which I did.
- I went to a public high school in Central Jersey.
It was just kind of that typical suburban Americana
high school kind of experience.
- Going to a private school,
a lot of the kids were almost like
what you would see in Gossip Girl.
You know, super posh.
I was one of 15 to 20 Black kids in the entire school.
My mom actually ended up working a second job
just to send me there.
- When I first came to this country
and I saw the high school,
I knew I needed to get out of there.
Every Friday there was a fight.
The graduation rate was about 11%.
- I work as an event planner in New York City.
- I'm a TV host.
- I am the CEO of an electronic components company.
I do believe I am the most successful person in my class.
- I don't talk to many people from my high school
but I would say given my hand and given my age,
I am probably the most successful.
When I purchased my home, I was 23.
Being able to put that down payment
not only made me feel proud,
but I knew it made other people that look like me proud
and it set me up for the next few years.
- I think a lot of people think I'm the most successful
because I'm probably the most well-known
or the most famous.
I personally don't feel that way
because there's people I graduated with
that are doctors or lawyers.
They're like curing disease,
they're fighting in the military,
they're raising families,
they're giving something to society
and I just talk on camera.
I think luck's a huge part of success.
There are so many things that come to you in life
that are completely beyond your control.
So here's an example.
My first ever job that I got out of college,
I was at a job fair and I was there all weekend
and I got lots of auditions, interviews, and no offers.
The very last day, I went to the bathroom
at the convention center before I went back to my hotel
and I bumped into a guy there
who was wearing a shirt with a logo I didn't recognize,
I struck up a conversation.
Turns out he had a friend that wasn't there
but that was hiring for a job,
put me in touch, I interviewed a week later
and got my first job ever.
But for me, that was luck in my mind
because what if I had drank
one less bottle of water that day
and didn't have to go to the bathroom?
What if I had decided, hey, I'm gonna go back
to the bathroom at my hotel room?
- Luck does not play a part at all.
As soon as you choose to get up that day,
you are paving your path.
You're choosing to do something
instead of just not doing anything
and more things happen, but if you just choose
to feel sorry for yourself and say, ah,
you know what, the first three days
I didn't get any job offers, I'm not gonna go back,
but you went back.
- I think that if you get up,
you get out of bed every day,
you have a chance at being successful,
but I think race, gender,
the situation you're born into
plays a huge part into it.
You could work just as hard as me
and probably be more talented than I am,
but you just didn't get that one opportunity
or you didn't get that one luck
or you didn't get the chance to take that unpaid internship
because you had to work all summer.
You know, I think that plays a huge part into it.
Sometimes being a Black woman,
you don't wanna come across as crazy Black woman right,
or even in the office, you have to make sure
how you present yourself and how you speak,
you know, and people are always looking at
the way you carry yourself.
And growing up, my parents always said
the minute you enter the room,
people are gonna be staring at you the entire time,
whether you see it or not,
but they're gonna be looking at you through a microscope.
- Being a woman and being a Spanish
plays a lot in this world.
I have to work double for them to be able
to take me seriously.
I've always been realistic.
My reality was that I was in the Bronx.
About 56% of the population back then
of the women get pregnant very early.
As I was going to high school,
the first thing I saw was this girl,
she had her child carrying everything
and carrying all the stuff and putting it on the bus.
I had at that moment, I said,
I'm not going to be in the statistics.
I had to actually just do everything and anything
to get out of there.
It is not fair,
at least I accept the challenge, let's say,
that is what you make, how hard do you work,
how much do you want it?
One person had said to me,
in front of everybody in my office,
and she said to me, you think you're better
than everybody else.
I threw it back at her.
I said yes, I am better.
I'm better because I make myself better.
I'm proud that I came up from the Bronx.
I'm proud that I was really poor
and I told her don't you dare try to make me feel
bad about what I have accomplished in life.
If any millionaire wanna use my story, have at it.
Maybe it will inspires all the people
to say you know what, opportunity is there.
What are you going to do to get that opportunity?
- I do think that if you don't have success,
it doesn't mean that you didn't want it.
I think that maybe you just didn't have
the right opportunities or the right information
to get you to where you wanted to be
or you didn't have that one cheerleader,
that one person kind of cheering you along
or supporting you so you could take, you know,
this opportunity to land you to here.
What about the other minorities
or even anyone of any race
that you know, wants to get that dream job
working for the big company or the big bank
but didn't have the chance to go to school?
Or wants to be able to take this opportunity
to go to this job fair after school,
but they have to take care of their kids,
or you know, their siblings or whatnot.
So I do think everyone has a chance
at being successful, but it's other factors outside
that limit you from being able to go where you wanna go.
- 'Cause it's definitely inspirational
and motivational, your story, I totally agree,
but do you feel it's still typical?
I think it's a big problem in this country
that you point at one successful example of something
and say all the problems are fixed.
- Right.
- Like look, they could do it,
or this is what happens, when sometimes
that's the exception that proves the rule
and I think that's a little bit exploitative.
There are a lot of problems that one person
who's successful doesn't mean that they're all fixed.
- Yeah, even when I am that story, I would have issue
as well too, with them using that as a blanket statement.
The way that I was able to get it done also
by having a work mom, by my mom being able to work,
by me not actually having to a lot of the simple things.
- These people who are saying oh,
well I did when I was your age.
I worked a job and was able to afford a house
and a car and pay off college.
Yeah, well college only cost $8,000 then.
And it's costing $58,000 a year now.
And I think for younger people
and people from minorities and from marginalized groups
that don't have the infrastructure to have
either scholarships or have family money
to pay for these things or to help out,
that's something that I think
a lot of people don't realize
if they're not in that situation
that that's the reality for a lot of people.
(light music)
- I don't think high school should have superlatives.
I think it puts everybody in a bucket (laughs)
and you know, kind of puts those labels on you.
I don't see the point in them.
- It could be bad or it could be good.
- Getting told when you are 18
that you're most likely to succeed
out of the hundreds of other kids your age,
that's terrifying and I started to think,
well, what do I have to do to live up to that feeling
and live up to all those expectations people had of me?
- It is a pressure that you have to just always be there,
be the best.
Now on the other hand, it pushes you.
- I think school should put more of a focus
on finding your passion and not necessarily
finding a job that pays the bills.
You know, you don't have to be a lawyer or a doctor,
a banker to make good money.
As long as you can find something you're passionate about
and you have the hard work, you can do any job.
- Do what makes you happy
and everything else will fall into place.
(light electronic music)