The following guest post is by author.听奥补濒濒补肠别听will be a keynote speaker听at the听at the听.
A few years ago I spoke in front of a diverse group of students. As I walked onto the stage, the students didn鈥檛 look up and chatted among themselves. I began my presentation, and their conversations continued. For a flash moment, I was filled with fear. Then I realized that they didn鈥檛 know anything about me.
I stopped speaking, and the conversations ceased. That鈥檚 when I decided to ask them this question: Who do you think I am? I gave them full permission to give honest replies.
Hands immediately shot up and the responses came fast and furious. Privileged white woman. Rich. Never had a hard day in your life.
I answered them just as rapidly by introducing the fabric of my life: daughter of a concentration camp survivor. Granddaughter of a slave. First family member to attend university.
As barriers came tumbling down and misconceptions discussed and dispelled, cell phones were immediately pocketed. We were making human connections now. Our new conversation was dynamic, honest, and heartfelt. It lasted for more than an hour.
This wasn鈥檛 my first experience of being judged by appearance. A few years after journalism school, I auditioned for a news reporter job. The director suggested I become a 鈥渨eather girl.鈥� I refused and spent twelve years reporting and eventually anchoring the network news.
When I followed my passion to cover sports like the NHL, even before I filed my first feature, I was booed by male reporters who believed that a woman had no right to report on a 鈥渕an鈥檚 sport.鈥�
Looking back, I realize that those early experiences prepared me to write about advocacy.
Now, as an author of middle-grade and young adult nonfiction, it鈥檚 my responsibility to put my investigative journalism skills to work peeling away the layers of misconception to get at the truth. Once the truth is established, it鈥檚 essential to place that truth into context and present the story with a narrative force equal to a gripping novel. It鈥檚 the kind of hard work that can take years. The effort is a pure labor of love. But the fourth layer of story is where I come in. My own history as a barrier breaker鈥攕teeped in the legacy of strength through struggle鈥攆orms the final lens through which I connect the story to our humanity.
When the reader recognizes this connection, the spark of advocacy is ignited and a shift occurs. It has the potential to carry the reader into adulthood seeing the world as 鈥渨e,鈥� instead of 鈥渙ther.鈥�
It鈥檚 the same spark that invites us to explore why it鈥檚 so easy to judge a person by appearance and so hard to value another identity if it鈥檚 not the same as our own.
So when we meet at 起点传媒this November, let鈥檚 pierce the barrier of misconception and embrace our shared humanity. Let鈥檚 discuss the stories of real-life advocates for social change who have gone before us and left invaluable blueprints on how to create the world we want to live in.
is the author of the new biography Blood Brother: Jonathan Daniels and His Sacrifice for Civil Rights. Her first young adult novel, Muckers, is a Booklist Top 10 Sports Book for Youth and a Bank Street College Best Children鈥檚 Book of the Year. Before becoming an author, Sandra broke a gender barrier in sports. She was the first woman to host an NHL broadcast on network television.