Her Story
About Yolanda
My journey into education wasn't the traditional route. I became a professional in the entertainment industry first, then transitioned into teaching about three and a half years ago, though I still maintain my contacts in entertainment. Now I'm a professor at North Carolina A&T State University, an HBCU, where I teach everything from general education composition courses with freshmen and sophomores, to introduction to creative writing with sophomores and juniors, to historical adaptation for film with my upper classmen. In that film adaptation class, I've had the privilege of working with authors like Aaron Shetterly on his novel 'Morningside: the 1979 Greensboro Massacre and the Search for the Soul of a City,' where my students and I adapted it for film. His wife, Margo Shetterly, wrote Hidden Figures, which was adapted for film, so we followed a similar process with autoethnographic studies, ethnographic research, interviewing individuals, and searching archives. As coordinator for student success, I spend a great deal of my time forging partnerships with corporations like App Global and non-profit organizations to secure internships and job opportunities for my students, especially those in history, English, and poli-sci who often get overlooked when STEM-focused employers come to campus. I'm also an advisor to the Creative Writing Club and the undergraduate advisor for Sigma Tau Delta, the international English Honor Society. I'm currently pursuing my PhD in writing and rhetoric at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, and I have my literary attorney negotiating a contract with Bloomsbury Publishing International after their representative saw me speak at a UNCG conference. I'm working on a manuscript with an October 31st deadline this year, developing a limited series for a streaming platform based on work from my class, and writing a children's book that my chair requested.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Yolanda
01What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I've ever received is the one that I share with my students: You're here to discover yourselves, the world around you, and your place in it. If you think that you want to go into a particular career, then it is imperative that you have an internship to actually experience what it is like to be in that field. When students leave our university, it's wonderful that they have that degree, but coupled with that, you need to actually have experience so that you can discover, while you're still here in school, whether or not you want to continue on the trajectory that you're going, or if you want to make an adjustment and do something else. I would actually say, take every opportunity to discover yourself. Leave no rocks unturned. Actually go and experience what you think you'd like to know and what you study.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
The field of education is so vast. Discover yourself first. Decide exactly what is it that you would like to do. And then understand, just like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, everything that you need, you already have. You just need to realize it, and enjoy your journey. And once you complete your education, when you're at your interview and you're at that job, always give back what you've received. Pour into others. Make sure that you're filled first, but always pour into others the way that you were either poured into, or wished that you were poured into.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
There are so many opportunities. A lot of times when business professionals have reached the point where they're working on giving back, it's amazing. They'll partner with us, they'll come back and speak to the students, actually create opportunities for them. We also have an advisory board full of professionals that help us with fundraising and also provide internships, job shadowing, and interviewing opportunities to our students. I find that this is extremely helpful. Most people in general would like to give back, so those are unique opportunities for the students. A challenge is just trying to determine what's next in the field of education based on whatever mandates are handed down from the top office in the country. So, just understanding that landscape for the future.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
If I had to choose maybe one or two out of them all, I would say integrity and accountability. You must work with a sense of integrity. For me, what that looks like is it encompasses being loyal, it encompasses doing the right thing the right way, even if no one is looking. It's also related to accountability. I need to hold students accountable to do their part. I would definitely say working with excellence, having integrity, always willing and choosing to do the right thing, whether or not anyone is looking at you, and then being accountable to yourself and holding others accountable, meaning advocate for yourself.
Keep Exploring
More Influential Women · North Carolina
Join Influential Women and start making an impact. Register now.