Latasha Hales

I attribute my success to just a desire to do better and be better. Neither of my parents completed college. My mom started college but had her first baby in her first year and never went back. My dad never went to college. He kind of took on the family business as a trucker in their trucking company. None of my siblings went to college either. I think I just wanted to be the difference. I wanted to be the change. That drive to break the cycle and create something different for myself and show what's possible has been the foundation of everything I've accomplished.

The best advice I've ever received is that there is nothing you can't do and there is nothing you can't have if you are willing to work for it. My mom always taught us there's never a reason to be jealous of anyone because there's nothing they have that you can't have. It really helps because I can't find myself being jealous of anyone. There's nothing that they're doing that you can't do. There's nothing that they've accomplished that you couldn't accomplish if you put in the same effort and the same work. You can have the same things. That mindset has shaped how I approach every challenge and opportunity in my life.

There's always somebody who needs what you have. Regardless of what you have, somebody needs it. So until you're able to really break out of your shell, somebody is waiting patiently on what you have. You need somebody who's gone down that road to say, look, I changed my major five times. I have a horrible semester on my transcript. I've had times where I was like, this is not for me. You need somebody who's open and honest that I've gone where you are, I've been where you are. It has not always been easy. I quit more times than I want to admit, and I didn't know what I wanted to do. But there's a blessing on the other side of this. You just gotta get through this. I understood that the mistakes that I made were not about me, but that I can relate to somebody else.

In higher education, the biggest challenge right now is the changes being made to the availability of funds. College is getting higher and harder to afford, and we're so reliant on governmental funds that I think we forget how we can make these things available for ourselves. Recent changes include capping student loans at $200,000 for any career plan, changing the wording on what's a professional degree, taking away the Graduate Plus loans, diminishing some of the other grants that students were eligible for, and even capping what parents can take out as a loan to help their students. It's pushing everything back. That's why wherever I go, I'm always talking about starting scholarship programs. I ask companies and businesses what kind of scholarships they offer. I worked with my church and we've started a scholarship committee that offers scholarships to high school seniors in our congregation. At every baby shower I go to, I bring a piggy bank and ask everyone to put change in it, then remind the parents one month after the baby's born to start a 529 plan. We have to have a plan for ourselves because at some point, financial aid is going to be non-existent.

The values most important to me are to be the change you want to see and be who you needed at that age. I had no clue what I wanted to do with my life. I was just a smart girl, and everybody just thought I would figure it out, and I'm like, I can't. So being who I needed at that age causes me to be there for them. I needed somebody to tell me the truth. I needed somebody to tell me, look, it's hard, but you'll figure it out. That's what I needed. I didn't need anyone to just say, oh, you got it, when I didn't. Tell me it's hard, tell me I'm gonna want to quit, but I'll be okay. That's how I live my life, to be who I needed. If you want the world to be different, then you make the world different. If you want the world to be better, then you make the world better. You may not be able to change the world, but you can change the world for one person.