The last thing these kids need to do is stick to their ways, only associate with similar people, go nowhere and change nothing.

I really do love the situation where a student who is full of “poor me” runs into people such as Supreme Court Justice Kennard and hear first hand of her life growing up in a POW Camp – or any number of Bay Area professionals who deal with debilitating health issues or handicaps and still get up every day and go to work/school/whatever.

This sort of thing is what the schools can do for the students that the children can’t easily get from their homes and families. Open doors. Introduce people. Give lectures of life stories and overcoming adversity. It’s not so much an “inspirational” thing as just knowledge being power. The more the students see and hear how careers got made, the more likely they may be to take an opportunity when it presents itself in the future for only 5 minutes.

The more of this the better.