2018. I was a student in Y-Scholars, a college preparedness program for Black students. We took an out-of state trip to California for the Oakland Black College Expo and although we were there for business, we had time to play. The last bullet point on that day’s itinerary read, “dinner and special evening activity.” As I traveled from booth to booth at the College Expo, my mind wandered back to that bullet point as I wondered what our facilitators had up their sleeves.
In a room filled with an intergenerational group of people, Willard Jimerson described how at 13 he was sentenced to 23 years in prison and how that had influenced his life.
“It’s our responsibility, for some of us who came out of the graveyard and woke up to go back to that particular cemetery with alarm clocks and throw them out there to wake people up,” he said.
