As a lead-in to Black History Month, Washington University’s Black Letterwinning Athlete Coalition (BLAC) hosted a University Athletic Association alumni career panel on Sunday, Jan. 31. The panel featured five former student-athletes, four of whom competed at UAA schools and another currently working at WashU. Student-athletes, coaches, and administrators from all UAA schools were invited.
The panelists were Dani Wadlington (Director of Mathematics Education and Bears’ track and field alum), CJ Harrington (corporate law associate and WashU men’s basketball alum), Marc-Daniel Julien (SpaceX software engineer and Carnegie Mellon track and field alum), Penina Acayo (Associate Professor of Communication Design at WashU and a Kent State track and field alum), and Chandler Malone (entrepreneur and venture capitalist and WashU men’s basketball alum).
The event was moderated by WashU BLAC co-presidents Caira Watson-Haynes and Eka Jose, and WashU BLAC vice president of operations Kameron Mack. “The beauty of the event and the speakers we had is that the discussion quickly transitions from career-focused to one filled with practical and thought-provoking life advice,” Jose commented. “Our panelists have a lot more professional experience than we do so of course they were able to share their career journeys and things they learned along the way. We all shared a bond having a similar identity as UAA athletes and Black individuals, which elevated the conversation to more of a mentor-mentee or friend-to-friend discussion, which created a more fruitful conversation than if it was solely career-focused.”
Wadlington, who earned master’s degrees at Stanford University and University of California, Berkeley, became a teacher in San Jose, which she notes has a similar percentage of Black people as Boise, Idaho. “My experience as a Black teacher is much different than the experiences of teachers in general. I love being a teacher, but it has taxed me in so many ways. I have learned that you don’t need a specific position to be a leader. You just need those skills. That is part of what led to me to build Quetzal Education Consulting (whose goal is to provide culturally sustaining solutions for an equitable education) with two other people because the work I could have been doing as a principal, I can do as a consultant,” she stated. “People listen more to that role. I am able to do the same work in a different way. Sometimes what you are looking to do in your career may not be tied to a position or place, but thinking about how you want to create a path to do what you want to do.”
Acayo knew at a young age that she wanted to be an architect, though she acknowledged she didn’t know what that meant. “I was good at math and art. I was becoming this thing (architect) I didn’t really know,” she pointed out. Everything changed when she started taking liberal arts courses outside of her major. “I took a course on executive digital design and my mind was blown. I fell in love with graphic design and the teaching fell in my lap. I allowed myself to dream and to just be. Allow yourselves the flexibility to be surprised by experiences in life. Try not to live in that ‘what if’ space. Just explore it and see where it goes. If it doesn’t work out, then switch gears.”
Malone’s experience also exemplified the importance of being flexible. “My path was very roundabout and not linear. I was really interested in becoming an attorney. As a sophomore, just hanging out with friends, I stumbled into an opportunity to build a company. At this point, I was completely veering off my path of going to law school,” he admitted. “I was just trying to figure out a path in life. In my junior year, I began working at a venture capital firm. Working in finance was a huge stretch for me.” He recently founded The Ideate Project, creating (along with current WashU football student-athlete Jacob Dodd), ideas to better prepare university students for entrepreneurial and career success. “In terms of takeaways from my journey, I am still very much processing it. The most vital thing for me was recognizing that life is not a linear path at all, that there is so much flexibility in what you can do and who you can be.”
After graduating from WashU, Harrington went to Stanford Law School and post-graduation from there, immediately went into corporate law. “The thing I have tried to do is create as much optionality as possible while going in a linear path. As an undergraduate, I double majored in political science and in business, and I tried to get as much leadership experience as I could,” he narrated. “In law school, I did a lot of work with criminal justice initiatives and criminal justice policy. There are certain points in life when you do have to choose. Figure out what you want in life and in your current role, get as much out of that as possible.”
Julien interned with SpaceX in the summer before his senior year at Carnegie Mellon and has worked there since graduating in 2016. “I had applied for the SpaceX internship as a sophomore and got turned down. There are a lot of times you apply for things and don’t get them. Then you figure out what you need to do for the next time. ‘What do I need to learn to get better?’ If you don’t get something you apply for the first time, don’t be afraid to keep applying,” he recommended. “I just went back to school and took in everything I was learning in class and took on as many personal projects as I could. I did whatever I could to find a way to stand out. I made myself a better engineer and a better human being. Don’t give up on things you want to do because you won’t always get what you want on the first try.”
“It was inspiring to hear stories from so many different perspectives. Sometimes our experiences seem isolated. When people share stories with vulnerability, as all the panelists did, we realize that our experiences are interconnected. That is inspiring to me,” Mack remarked. “It was so great to see this event come together. Two of the main pillars of our organization are mentorship and academic excellence, and this event allowed us to incorporate both,” Watson-Haynes added. “By connecting former UAA student-athletes with current UAA student-athletes, we hope to build a pipeline for future mentorship opportunities.”