In the interview with Raul Cuero, he states multiple times that he was discriminated against and faced a lot of adversities in his life. At one point, he also stated that he felt like he had no value once he stepped off the basketball court. With all these things he went through and all these thoughts, he made the choice to overcome them and work 10x harder because he wanted to be important off the basketball court some day. He wanted to be celebrated and used all of what we may consider as "negative' to aim higher and work harder.
This interview with Raul Cuero speaks on topics that I believe are still prevalent today and may be relatable to some of today's youth. For instance, students who get recruited to D1 schools for various sports are only nurtured in those sports with little consideration given to their success in the classroom. While some schools do a great job with balancing them out, several universities focus more on sports which in turn leave these students at a disadvantage when they graduate.
It is extremely tough enough being a student-athlete, so I understand how hard it is to earn good grades in addition to that. In those 4 years of being a top athlete at a top school, that attention feels great until it is gone and the institution moves on to the next great athlete. A good amount of black individuals, especially males in todays society live lives similar to what Raul Cuero's looked like. Raul beat the odds, and decided he was not going to be limited by what society thought of him and became a top name in his field!!
In today's world it's a very unfortunate cycle that goes on within the African American community. It is an issue that not a lot of people will understand unless they've lived a day in their shoes, African Americans that is, and from the outside looking in their life seems very different from what it actually is. There are lots of opportunities in America, but opportunities for African Americans are limited for one reason or the other, including but not limited to; geography, socioeconomic background, connections etc.
I agree with a lot of what Cuero says in his interview. It is true that these days, especially in the westernized parts of the world, parents don't want the responsibility of their child's education. They expect teachers and tutors to take care of everything education related. Some parents are more about getting promotions at work (which also is important) than sacrificing a little bit of time to make sure their child is doing well both in school and overall wellbeing. And by sacrificing time, I mean coming home a little bit earlier or arranging a parent-teacher meeting to make sure all is well. I think things like that play a major role in how well a child does in school and as they grow up.
In the Interview, Patricia asked Cuelo a question that I think is very important. She asked him "how did you find creative solutions for life's problems, when did you realize that you needed to be creative to overcome the things that happened to you?" In short Raul simply said that when you're looked down upon, you should change the expectations by doing something that others don't think you could achieve. He gave examples on how he turned bad times to opportunities to learn and be creative. I think it is so important that we remain grateful and thankful for every little thing that we have because someone somewhere is fighting to just survive. Often times we get caught up in the superficial problems we have and automatically think our life is the worst, and we do that because we're human. And humans are so imperfect.
Ultimately, what I learned from this interview is that life will get hard and when it does I need to remember the end goal and keep working hard. It also taught me to keep being creative, in terms of using what we have in whatever situations we find ourselves. We won't always have the best resources, in those situations we have to use our minds to figure something out. It's also important to keep the brain working, this wasn't talked about in the interview but Dr. Cuero isn't what a a lot of us would consider young, but he keeps his mind active. He also tries to give back in any way he can, including teaching the youth that look up to him and are interested in his profession. He is the epitome of perseverance, in my opinion.
A quote I liked from the video; "Out of difficulties grow miracles" - Jean De La Bruyere"
This interview with Raul Cuero speaks on topics that I believe are still prevalent today and may be relatable to some of today's youth. For instance, students who get recruited to D1 schools for various sports are only nurtured in those sports with little consideration given to their success in the classroom. While some schools do a great job with balancing them out, several universities focus more on sports which in turn leave these students at a disadvantage when they graduate.
It is extremely tough enough being a student-athlete, so I understand how hard it is to earn good grades in addition to that. In those 4 years of being a top athlete at a top school, that attention feels great until it is gone and the institution moves on to the next great athlete. A good amount of black individuals, especially males in todays society live lives similar to what Raul Cuero's looked like. Raul beat the odds, and decided he was not going to be limited by what society thought of him and became a top name in his field!!
In today's world it's a very unfortunate cycle that goes on within the African American community. It is an issue that not a lot of people will understand unless they've lived a day in their shoes, African Americans that is, and from the outside looking in their life seems very different from what it actually is. There are lots of opportunities in America, but opportunities for African Americans are limited for one reason or the other, including but not limited to; geography, socioeconomic background, connections etc.
I agree with a lot of what Cuero says in his interview. It is true that these days, especially in the westernized parts of the world, parents don't want the responsibility of their child's education. They expect teachers and tutors to take care of everything education related. Some parents are more about getting promotions at work (which also is important) than sacrificing a little bit of time to make sure their child is doing well both in school and overall wellbeing. And by sacrificing time, I mean coming home a little bit earlier or arranging a parent-teacher meeting to make sure all is well. I think things like that play a major role in how well a child does in school and as they grow up.
In the Interview, Patricia asked Cuelo a question that I think is very important. She asked him "how did you find creative solutions for life's problems, when did you realize that you needed to be creative to overcome the things that happened to you?" In short Raul simply said that when you're looked down upon, you should change the expectations by doing something that others don't think you could achieve. He gave examples on how he turned bad times to opportunities to learn and be creative. I think it is so important that we remain grateful and thankful for every little thing that we have because someone somewhere is fighting to just survive. Often times we get caught up in the superficial problems we have and automatically think our life is the worst, and we do that because we're human. And humans are so imperfect.
Ultimately, what I learned from this interview is that life will get hard and when it does I need to remember the end goal and keep working hard. It also taught me to keep being creative, in terms of using what we have in whatever situations we find ourselves. We won't always have the best resources, in those situations we have to use our minds to figure something out. It's also important to keep the brain working, this wasn't talked about in the interview but Dr. Cuero isn't what a a lot of us would consider young, but he keeps his mind active. He also tries to give back in any way he can, including teaching the youth that look up to him and are interested in his profession. He is the epitome of perseverance, in my opinion.
A quote I liked from the video; "Out of difficulties grow miracles" - Jean De La Bruyere"
Based on reading your response, there were so many different points that Raul discussed in the video that you spoke about and I had just brushed over. I had completely forgot that Raul talked about how parents do not take any responsibility for their children's education which in some circumstances can be very true. Overall, I really liked how you incorporated all the different points made in the video in your response, rather than just narrowing in on the creativity.
ReplyDeleteThank you!!
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