There are two women in my audience today
who had no idea I would be talking about them.
But in my opinion they are the kind
of people we can all learn from.
They're educators from Brooklyn, New York,
in a community where only 4% of the kids go to college.
They come from homes where the homes sometimes have no food,
and yet 93% of their seniors from last year
are currently in college.
Let's talk about the community that the school is in.
So we are in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn,
and it is one of Brooklyn's most under-served communities.
Over 28% of the children under the age of 16 live in poverty.
These kids are just amazing.
No matter what is happening at home,
no matter what they've gone through, they never give up.
These kids have overcome all kinds of things,
and they go to school every single day.
And they work hard every single day.
And all they want to do is go to college.
We've done something that we've never--
never done anything this big before.
We reached out to the people at Walmart,
and they want to give each one of you a four-year scholarship.
[SCREAMING AND CHEERING]
I cannot wait to see in four years what these young people
are going to do.
I can't wait to see how we helped launch their lives.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Happy Friday everybody!
I can tell you that the class of 2017, 100% of our kids
got into college.
Period, the end.
Wherever we go, our kids are being recognized.
You hear, hey, you're from Red Hook?
Oh wait, I heard about a school there.
Oh yeah, that's our school.
This community has been challenged.
And if you looked up Red Hook two years ago,
you would see drugs and crime.
Now when you type in "Red Hook Brooklyn"
into your computer browser, you see, oh,
that's the community where those kids are going to college.
And the scholarship afforded our scholars a loan-free education.
Kids aren't graduating thinking, how
am I going to pay this back?
Our kids are going to graduate saying,
how will I pay it forward?
What can I do to help someone else?
Because Ellen and Walmart have helped me.
This is Miss Campbell's office.
I'm usually spending a lot of time in here,
like when I'm supposed to be in class but I come here.
Keanna picked me.
She is what Summit is really about.
She came here, she was a bit of a terror.
We weren't sure that college was really what her future held.
When I first came to this school, I was loud, I was rude,
I was fighting.
Like, if I didn't come to this school I think I'd be in jail.
There wouldn't be-- there wouldn't be no me
here, because of her.
Hey Keanna.
Hi!
Oh my god.
So when do you leave?
Tomorrow.
Wow.
Are you nervous?
Yes.
Yes?
What are you nervous about?
I think it's because I'm not going to be with people--
like, Summit people.
Keanna is one of those kids that, like,
you just fall in love with.
Yeah, I feel like sitting here and talking
to you about my whole life, and you won't judge,
you won't say nothing.
You'll just be, like, well, Keanna,
you know that probably wasn't a good idea.
I say, yeah, I know, but I was mad, you know?
I could talk to her--
I could talk to you about anything.
And her story is amazing.
Her mom had her when she was in middle school.
There's no shame in her having her at middle school,
because guess what, she has a kid going to college.
That says a lot.
She's a kid who just perseveres.
She does not give up, and she doesn't
let tragedy hold her down.
Right here was my essay.
Got a 94 on it.
It was sitting right here.
And guess where my seat was.
Right here.
So every day I would look up at it, like, I did that.
That was my favorite-- one of my highest scores I ever got.
And it was a 94.
Every memory, like, I have here is always, like, a good memory.
I never had a bad, bad memory.
Here is where I'm happy.
I'm going to miss being here, you know?
I love this school, you know?
This school is like my home.
And this school is a college preparatory school,
so they prepped me for college.
And now I'm going.
So now I've got to show them, like,
all the things you taught me, I'm going to do it in college.
You're going to see how great I am at doing it too, you know?
School helped me a lot.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
All right, guys, don't make me emotional.
I don't know what I would be doing right now if it wasn't
for my school, if it wasn't for my family and my support
system.
I'm going to see where you're going.
You know he's not going far, right?
He might not be going far, but he's going very far.
He going to get a brain that you and me and nobody else has got.
I'm going to be more on my own, which is cool.
But, like, I'm always used to my grandmother and my family
steering me towards the good path.
Now I'll have to do that on my own.
It's nerve wracking.
I'm not really sure what the future has in store for me,
but I know it's going to be great.
I feel like after me, you're going to be right behind me.
You're going to do so good.
You're going to do better than me.
I know that.
How you know that?
Trust me.
I'm a young visionary.
This comes natural.
[LAUGHTER]
Ellen and Walmart definitely changed our lives.
I'm going to make it out the Hook.
Yes!
And I hope he buys Grandma a house and gets me out too.
[LAUGHS]
You ready?
Because you outta here.
I know.
I can't-- no choice.
It is a choice.
But you made the best choice.
I did.
When I look at Quincy, I see his mother.
My daughter passed away, like, four days after she had Quincy.
And he had a hole in his heart.
They had to make sure the hole mended.
But he made it.
He's getting ready to be a college kid now,
so I did my job.
I'm going to have a good time.
Yes.
I want you to have a good time.
I want you to learn, not have a good time.
I want you to learn.
And have a good time.
You're going to throw that good time in there,
but you're going to go there to learn, right?
I promise.
I know.
I am.
I will.
When he leaves here, my heart's going to be dragging right
behind him.
Trust me.
It is.
It really is.
What scares me is he don't know nobody up there.
I just want him to make sure he calls me every day saying,
Grandma, I'm OK, and I'll be happy.
Because I'm scared for him.
So--
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[SIRENS BLARING]
Like, I'm always with my mom.
I'm really close with my mom.
I'm like a mama's boy.
You know it's not that far.
I guess I'll take the bus every weekend.
No, you can't come every weekend.
You can't come every weekend.
Listen.
You can't do that.
Don't tell me what I can't do.
You can come maybe every-- one time a month.
That's why you have Facetime.
I'm attending SUNY Broome in the fall.
And I'm going to be studying criminal justice.
I think my mom is most upset to leave, because, you know,
I'm like her baby.
I'm the youngest.
And I'm, like, the first person to go to college in my family.
So I'm leaving my mom.
It's kind of sad.
I love all three of my kids, but he's my baby.
He's my everything.
Ruddy's special because, one, he's from Red Hook.
He is the epitome of what it means to persevere and work
hard.
Ruddy was not a scholar all along.
He came to school because he had to.
Thank you Ellen and Walmart.
Thank you.
Because you probably would have went to college right here.
We probably couldn't afford it.
And I did not want that to happen.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I never cry like this.
I cry like this one time, when I had to leave him back.
And I cried and cried and cried.
That was the hardest thing in my life,
to tell his teacher to leave him back in third grade.
He would have not been in this 2017 graduation.
He's supposed to graduated in 2016.
I-- me, his mother--
told his teacher to leave him back,
because he was struggling.
That was the hardest thing I could ever do.
Because all his friends was going to the next grade
and he couldn't go.
That was the hardest thing.
And now he's going to college.
That's another hardest thing.
To see Ruddy during his senior year--
because he was a little behind and we weren't certain if he
was going to graduate on time--
he busted his rump.
I'm super excited to see what he's going to do,
because he knows what it means to get this scholarship.
Because he wasn't going to be a part of this class.
When you go to college, I want you to do
what you're supposed to do.
Do your four years.
Make me proud of you.
Make sure you go out there and you be the man that you're
supposed to be.
Make me proud.
Nobody else.
I want you to come with that law paper and say, Ma, I did it.
OK?
Don't cry.
[MUSIC - SIA, "I SURVIVED']
I played on my own.
I survived.
I can't.
I can't do this no more.
I'm alive.
I'm going to miss this gym.
This little tiny gym?
Remember when the ball slapped me in the face?
She thinks that Summit is her home.
She leaves her sneakers everywhere, her clothes--
I think every gym period I got hit in the face with a ball.
Every single gym period.
And I don't know how.
Like, I watched the ball come hit me in the face.
I was, like, I probably deserved that.
Because I watched the ball come hit me in the face.
Five years of this.
[LAUGHTER]
Five years of this She's classic.