>> Cal State Long Beach, of course.
Go, beach!
[laughs] I studied black studies and language composition here at Cal State Long Beach.
I changed it several times.
I mean, coming here, my first thing, I wanted to be a lawyer.
That lasted for about a semester.
Then I wanted to be a sports agent.
I think that last for about two or three semesters.
And finally, you know, I knew that I wanted to work in events.
I was really good at planning things, really good at planning events,
and I was fortunate enough, I started -- my first job here was working in parking.
I started working as an undergrad in the parking office.
And from there, I picked up a bunch of things.
My boss was in payroll deduction, so I learned a lot of budgeting things and about working
with travel and contracts and things.
And so she encouraged me to apply for a full-time position here
on campus while I was still in my undergrad.
Which I did, and which I was offered a position at the athletics department
for men's and women's basketball.
So here I am as an undergrad, running a men's a women's basketball department,
and then beginning to supervise people that were much older than I.
And it was one of those things where it was a learning curve there.
But I continually across the way through this at Cal State Long Beach had people, mentors --
or what I like to call village partners -- people who were in my village that continued
to be vested in me and continued to push me through.
And they just helped me all the way through.
And, I mean, to this day, there's folks on this campus --
I just call myself a Long Beach State baby because I really did grow up here.