Intergenerational Mentorship
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
ah
i i am sancofa
i am someone’s daughter someone’s sister
a product of west dayton
a proud product of two illustrious
historically black universities
an engineer an executive director
a hope dealer but most importantly
i am sankofa
how many people have heard of sankofa
sankofa is an african metaphoric symbol
which depicts a bird
with the egg in its mouth flying
forwards while looking backwards
which signifies taking the knowledge
gained from the past
in hopes of using it towards the
progression of the future
it is imperative in african culture to
understand your
roots just like a tree it takes strong
roots to grow and bear fruit
what better way to acknowledge my roots
than by completing my college career
institutions that were made specifically
for me by leaders whose shoulders i
stand on today
leaders and fellow alums such as w.b du
bois
bayard rustin former dayton mayor clay
dixon
and current ohio state representative
joyce beatty
my freshman year at the central state
university
all freshmens were required to take a
first year seminar class
to help them get acclimated to their
newly found adult life
on the very first day of that class the
teacher asked a question that ultimately
changed my life she asked
how has your village contributed to your
life
up until this moment how has my village
contributed to my life up until this
moment
uh what am i doing for the village what
is my village
so many questions were going through my
mind that question made me look back on
my life
my 17 year old life at the time it made
me try to think of the first time that i
heard the concept of a village
i was nine years old when i started my
rise of passage leadership class
a leadership program designed to teach
african-american middle school-aged
children about their heritage and
culture
because as we all know sometimes it’s
not taught through affordable education
but the instructors didn’t just talk at
us they talked with us
everyone learned from each other young
old young people that look old
old people that act young they taught us
we taught them they empowered us
we empowered them they taught us you
never know
how or when you’re leaving impact or how
important your example could be for
someone else
they told us no matter who you are how
old you are where you’re from you have
something to contribute to the
betterment of your community
because you are a leader
i had no idea at the time but i know now
besides my actual family that was my
village
that was my introduction to intentional
intergenerational mentorship
growing up i was put in positions to be
a leader even though i never
really wanted to be and the people that
forced it on me the most was my family
and i don’t know if that’s because i was
the oldest out of all my cousins or
simply because i was the oldest sibling
in my household
but i was the only child for nine
very very quiet very lonely years and
then my baby sister demia was born
and when she was born i felt like it was
my job my duty my obligation to make
sure she was prepared for the world
the relationship that you have with your
younger and older siblings is considered
intergenerational mentorship
even if it isn’t intentional my
mentoring relationship with my sister
did not start off intentional
but the older i got the more i
understood the importance of sewing it
to her
so she could see the importance and pay
it forward
when i went off to college when i
dropped out
graduations good times and even not so
good times i made sure my sister was by
my side
to learn the skills get the ideas and
experiences
that are difficult to put in words but
only learn through tacit knowledge
not only does my sister attend my alma
mater she went up to me
and she is currently the 94th miss
wilberforce university
and when she ran for that position her
campaign title was legacy i asked her
why
she said honoring a legacy creating a
legacy
while intentionally leaving a legacy
the knowledge my sister acquired over
the years from being by my side
helped her understand the importance of
intergenerational mentorship
and this work of ultimately curating
this ideal world that we want to see
take another look at the saint
golferberg
well something you see now that you
didn’t necessarily pay attention to
before
the egg that egg represents
me and that moment of courage knowing
that i have the power to influence
someone else’s decisions right or wrong
good or bad
i am sankofa
it’s been 20 years since my rights of
passage leadership class and everything
that i’ve learned from then
up until now has helped prepare me it’s
helped prepare me for this moment
to be in a position to look back take
what i learned on my journey be
vulnerable to share it and not be
ashamed
and efforts to possibly aid someone else
on their journey
i know before today a couple of you may
maybe never heard of the word sancofa
but i do know a couple words that we
have all heard before
we have all heard the word legacy and we
have all heard the word responsibility
it is our responsibility to lift as we
climb
it is our responsibility to make sure
that we are leaving a legacy that
elevates those
that follow in our footsteps and for
anyone who identifies as a leader
as a leader it is our responsibility to
stand up
speak up and speak out if you see
something that is not right
you must say something you must do
something
we prepare for the future today right
now
that’s why i’m so passionate about
empowerment and leadership development
i’m a firm believer and you can’t be
what you can’t see and that’s why the
saint gopher bird looking back is so
important
we must see where we’ve been to know
where we need to go
the late great john lewis said
people on every continent have stood in
your shoes through
decades and centuries before you
and that is why the truth does not
change and the answers
worked out long ago can help us find the
solutions
to the troubles of our time
john lewis was not only sankofa while he
was alive
john lewis is sankofa
example he wrote an essay to be
published in the new york times on the
day of his funeral
encouraging us to continue to make good
trouble
i don’t know about anyone else but i
aspire to leave a legacy so great your
legacy never dies
your legacy never dies
it is the key to a better community it
is a key to the better city it is a key
ultimately to a better world
we must be intentional with the
relationships that we have
for it determines the type of people who
will continue our legacy once we leave
this world whether that’s good
or bad
when you take two sankofa birds and you
put them back to back
you create the duality of saint kofu
which is simply a heart that represents
one’s wings
once the bird appears it has the
knowledge that it needs and it is ready
to take that wisdom into the future
my intent is the only thing
that changes my saint gopher bird from
looking backwards to flying ahead with a
purpose
it is up
to each one of you to take a look back
figure out what will be the wind beneath
your wings so that you too
can leave a legacy so great it will be
talked about for generations to come
now how many people understand sankofa
we are the ones that we have been
waiting for
we are all
sankofa
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[Applause]
[Music]
you