THE
VALUE OF
WOMEN SPECIAL REPORT
HISTORY
Do you have a favorite
quote that has guided you
throughout your life? Q
In elementary school,
we had little brag books
and one of the nuns
at the school wrote a
“This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.”
There are so many things that come
along in life where you can get derailed,
you get slapped down, you have obstacles
in your way. It’s critically important
to be focused and be persistent and to
know that if you don’t give up, you will
accomplish your objectives.
A
Corp. (HHC), which is a big job. By
chance, Bear Stearns was doing a
bond offering for HHC a few years
later. During that process, I met the
man who was the head of public
finance at Bear Stearns and we had
a good rapport. He thought I would
be a good candidate to work in public finance. That is how I met Henry
Cisneros. Bear Stearns was looking
at business in Texas and I got to
meet him in San Antonio when he
was mayor. I learned a great deal
from him. He was a great mentor.
My parents were always supportive and they felt education
was the key. When they came to
this country, they had to work in
factories, so it was not easy at all for
them. My father … eventually got
a master’s degree. My mother got
most of her formal education here,
while she was working day jobs. She
ended up getting a master’s degree
as well. They were big believers in
getting an education. There are six
of us. I’m the first child.
I went to a secretarial high
school because when I tried to
apply to an academic high school,
my elementary-school principal
advised my mother that I really
needed to get a skill so I could get
a job. Actually, it was more like a
directive. It didn’t make any sense
because I was really focused on
going to college. That just gave me
one more hurdle to deal with.
I had to enhance my learning and demonstrate the kind of
student I was. I found out about
a city-wide, Catholic, interracial-debating organization and I connected with them and I found out
they were all really smart kids,
very racially diverse, who were all
going to college, and so that was an
extracurricular activity. Through
them, I also found out there were
National Science Foundation grants
available to study some sophisticated subjects in the summer and
on weekends in college settings. So
I started applying and getting them.
In a sense, I built my own portfolio.
I got an unexpected opportunity in my senior year of high
school when I had a phone call
from a man by the name of Charlie
McCarthy, who ran the Yale
Transitional Year Program. It was
a one-year prep school for students
from the inner city who were poor,
to help them prepare to go to college. My records had been sent to
him and he called me at my home.
The college-application deadline
had already passed. He was getting
rid of some records and my file fell
open on the floor. When he looked
at my grades and SAT scores and
my profile, he thought I should go
to Radcliffe.
He said he was going to
Cambridge next week and thought
it would be nice if I could take
the train and meet him in New
Haven so we could drive over
there together and the dean could
interview me. I would say Charlie
McCarthy changed my life.
