Please Tell a Kid How Much A Venture Capitalist Makes Today
When sports is the only model of success presented to young Black boys, it sets up a framework of failure
Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.
Imagine if we expected people to choose their careers in sixth grade. If we regularly required 12-year-olds to make decisions that would dictate the rest of their lives. The thought makes little sense, yet for athletes, that’s essentially what happens. In order to become competitive at the college level — let alone the professional level — they have to start building those skills in childhood. Intrinsic talent and biology come into play, but few things build skills better than time and repetition.
Now imagine yourself in a room full of 12-year-old Black boys and ask them what they want to be when they grow up. I would bet money I don’t have that most of those boys would tell you they wanna ball — football or basketball, depending on where you are in the country, but the dream is the same.
There’s nothing wrong with having dreams as a kid. The problems come when those dreams are so lofty that they’re unachievable for the majority of people and so narrowly defined that they prevent kids…
