Last Chance

Today’s the last day of March and the last chance for you to help out the Boston Debate League in its March for Goodness competition. This is an organization that’s near and dear to my heart, and if you’ve enjoyed and/or profited from this blog, a $10 donation is a great way to say thank you. If we secure the most distinct donors of $10 or more, we stand to win $10,000!

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I’ve got another story for you today about the power of debate, this one actually from a similar organization that I worked with in Chicago before I founded the Boston Debate League. I was a junior at the University of Chicago: white, reasonably well-off, over-educated, and sheltered. I grew up in a solidly white, middle-class suburb of Baltimore and, aside from a few summers working at a 7-11 and a year of volunteering in the Chicago Debate League, I had very little experience interacting with people from backgrounds different than my own.

I’d just gotten a job as an assistant coach in the CDL and had been assigned to Orr Academy, an under-performing (to put it mildly) high school in Chicago’s Harlem. As the name suggests, the neighborhood was virtually all black (the only white person I ever saw on the streets there was selling pornographic DVD’s out of a briefcase) and economically depressed.

At the first competition of the year, the director of the CDL introduced me to the head coach at Orr. I assumed that he would in turn introduce me to the students, but actually the first thing he told me was that he had to go and that I should “keep an eye on” the team for the rest of the day. He gestured vaguely towards the cafeteria table where they were all gathered and then headed out the door.

They were an intimidating bunch, mostly young men dressed in “urban attire”. I would most definitely cross the street, or more likely find another street altogether, if I were to come upon that same group standing on a corner at night. It was hard for me to imagine them taking my geeky white ass seriously, but I took a deep breath and tried to look confident as I walked towards them.

Seeing me approach, by far the largest of the young men stood up from the table and turned towards me. No exaggeration, this guy was 6’5 and I wouldn’t be surprised if he tipped the scales at 350 pounds. I met his gaze and held it until his round face finally burst into a wide smile. “You must be Mr. Brokos!” He shook my hand vigorously and introduced himself as Tarell. Then, draping an arm effortlessly over my shoulder, he took me around the table and introduced me one-by-one of the other members of the team, who all greeted me quite warmly.

I started visiting their school once a week, which entailed a one-hour ride on the Green line in each direction. It truly felt like stepping into a different world when I boarded the train in Hyde Park, the gentrified bubble that is home to the U of C, and disembarked an hour later amidst Harlem’s boarded-up windows and discarded syringes. Needless to say, I stuck out like a sore thumb walking from the train station to the school, and I never felt entirely comfortable.

As soon I stepped into the head coach’s classroom, though, I always got a warm greeting from Tarell, and his welcoming smile immediately put me at ease. He made small talk effortlessly, told me about the school and asked me what I’d been up to. Tarell was never a particularly good debater, but he was more dedicated to the activity than anyone else on the team. He was at every practice, and he always gave me an update on who would be coming that day, who would be late, who had to leave early, etc. During any group discussion, he was the most vocal, quick with a joke, but always encouraged others to participate as well. His easy confidence gave them the confidence to speak up, just as it had put me at ease back when we first met.

I never had any problems walking to the school, except once with a police officer who hassled me for a while, presumably because I thought he was there to buy drugs (in his defense, that probably is why the vast majority of white people walking the streets of Harlem are there). Once when I got to the school, though, there were far more students hanging around out front than usual. I had a bad feeling about the situation, but I’d already traveled an hour to get here, so I took a deep breath and tried to talk quickly through their midst towards the front door of the school, which was about 200 feet away.

Suddenly, a boy about 15-years old jumped out in front of me, stomping the ground loudly with his heavy boots. I jumped a bit and put my hands up defensively, and several of his friends laughed. He didn’t say anything, but he stared me straight in the eyes. When I tried to step around him to the right, he side-stepped as well to stay in front of me. I stepped to the left, but same thing. I tried to smile disarmingly and say, “Excuse me, my friend”, but he just stared back with angry eyes.

I don’t know what this guy was up to or what if anything would have happened next, but suddenly I saw Tarell walk out the front door of the school. I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad to see anyone. He stepped around the bully and put that familiar arm around my shoulder. “Come on, Mr. Brokos, everybody’s waiting for you inside.” The other boy disappeared into the crowd, and we walked into the school. “There’s going to be a big fight today. I thought maybe I should wait for you down here,” Tarell explained.

“Thanks,” I murmured, still shaken and a little embarrassed at having to be rescued by one of my students.

“Tarell sure seems like a natural for debate,” I commented to the head coach one day. “He’s so confident and outgoing.”

The coach smiled with amusement. “That’s Tarell after a year on the debate team. He used to be the shyest kid in class, always very sensitive about his weight. He always sat in the back of the room and wouldn’t say anything to anybody. Debate gave him that confidence to speak up.”

I don’t know what would have happened to Tarell if he hadn’t had the opportunity to debate, and frankly I don’t know where he is now either. I doubt that he’s a millionaire, but I know that he went to college, and I’m sure he’s a lot better off than he would have been without debate. It’s an activity that changes lives, particularly for young people like Tarell who have so few opportunities available to them at their schools. He wasn’t a genius, but he was a good person, a kind person, a caring and thoughtful person, and he deserved the opportunity to find his voice.

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