Project Destined and feeding the source: Education
How I can contribute to the Diversity & Equality Conversation
As we conclude our Juneteenth weekends, I’m left with the question, how do I play my part in racial equality? As a son of an inner-city English teacher of 35 years in the Philadelphia public school system, I’ve seen first hand what teachers that care can mean to the education of our minority youth. My mom taught in a predominantly African American school system. Her students often came from broken homes, had little expectations of higher education and felt the world was stacked against them. We would routinely have her students come over for dinner and spend quality time together. These were young adults (15-18) who often came from very low income homes and appreciated a home cooked meal more than you or I could imagine. They looked at my brother and I with admiration for having a nice upbringing and a peaceful home. They wanted that for themselves but often had familial responsibilities, social pressures and other external factors that got in the way of what I would call a comfortable upbringing. A decade later, I never forget those conversations at our dinner table with her students or my experiences visiting my mom’s classes. Now as a working professional in an industry that’s predominantly white males and built on an apprenticeship system, I’m highly conscious of my surroundings. So when I learned about Project Destined as a way of changing the racial makeup equation, I found it a meaningful avenue to pursue positive change. After all, I believe equality stems from education and that’s where I want to put my efforts.
Project Destined recognized a narrative and education problem for under-privileged and often minority students. Most students were being led to believe that the only real estate career was to be a realtor. Project Destined realized that students were not taught how to think like an owner or investor. They realized that schools were missing critical curriculum on how to think about real estate from an owners point of view. So when Cedric Bobo, a former partner at Carlyle, set out to address this, he woke up the entire real estate community and created partners / sponsorships in the monumental re-education effort. He soon paired large institutions like Greystar, Hines, CBRE, Los Angeles Lakers and more with public and private school systems in a conjoined and collective effort to educate these under-represented students.
I was introduced to Cedric through my good friend Eric and I quickly became enthralled by his idea and vision. I was able to enlist my company as an early partner in the effort and I was lucky enough to do some teaching of my own to the students in one of the cohorts. I spoke on innovation and the non-linear career paths that you can take in real estate and how to think about value-add technology investments to modernize a real estate owner. I spoke about mentorship and first principle thinking around how to find the right job and company for your skillsets and cultural fit. I then took more of a backseat to judge one of the student run competitions on who could come up with the best business plan for an apartment renovation in Brooklyn, NY. I was totally blown away by these students and their ability to absorb and apply these advanced concepts of capex budgets and cap rate compression. I knew I was witnessing the birth of some brilliant minds. I could visually see the impact that the Project Destined’s curriculum was having on the minds’ of these students. These students were all minorities who were attending community colleges in the greater New York City area. It was clear to me they were picking up what Cedric was putting down. I was so lucky to be a part of their journey and expect many of them to draw some very exciting offers for employment.
So as we conclude the Juneteenth weekend, I’m taking the time to celebrate and think about the amazing people and change agents within the african-american community who are bridging the gap today. I’m lucky to have met Cedric and to be bearing witness to the impactful change he’s making on inner cities and the education of our youth. He’s 12 cities and 1200 urban participants enrolled into the endeavor so far and I know this is just the beginning. I can’t wait to see how Project Destined continues to grow!
If you want to learn more about Project Destined, check it out here: https://projectdestined.com/
“1 in 3 people lack financial or investment literacy”