so we were raised the following question what if we could get every kid to follow 3 simple rules graduate from high school get a job and continue work and don't have children tell you're 21 and right now we've walked out at the entire country and we classified people according to whether they broke all those rules or they followed one or 2 or all 3 of the rules the results are astounding. so i started talking to judges and lawyers and doctors and health providers and interviewing people and literally asked thousands of people how many of you

throughout the course istria part of the united states and. we are segregated in america by social class but here's think about it who the middle class people hang out with. most middle class people don't know someone in poverty by 1st name and fit in down to dinner together. today millions of american families are caught in circumstances beyond their control. their children will be compelled to live lives of poverty unless the cycle is broken. president johnson's war on poverty has this one goal to provide everyone a chance to grow and make his own way and. i think everything in life that's important really lives in the grey like there's no black and white there's this gray how do we make it more clear of what the problem is there are so many different life experiences of poverty and we don't

have a real clear definition of the federal government doesn't it. they say if your family is more needed right about. to take care of your family for a year in 2000 does that mean that if you're making more you're not in red and that that's not the case i think the most difficult challenge. your way out of your current predicament. of course people cannot contribute to the nation if they are never taught to read or write. if their bodies are stunted from hunger. if their sickness going on him didn't get there live to spare him hopeless poverty just drawing a welfare check. so we rafted from the goodies to opportunity. we're also going to give all our people to help the very meat.

through goes. all of our welfare you get money and you get more if you have less income go through have 0 income get the biggest money. and then as you earn money lose part of the benefit sometimes if you were even $1.00 extra dollar the whole benefit medical. help for people and people who are disabled if that number seems low it should because it's based on 1000 fixed these costs of living in the sixty's economists came up with the formula for calculating the family needs and they said things like well we'll have a parent in the home so we don't have to include childcare people can walk to work so we don't have to include transportation and employers will pay for health care so we don't need to include that 3 major family expenses are not included in the 2017 federal poverty guideline where you have more women in the workplace than average in the history if you look at parents and divide their income into 5 equal

parts and let's just add bottom 20 percent of this would be parents with income below roughly $25000.00 and now we come watch their kids grow up and we made sure their kids income. 30 to 34 years of age are they doing better than kids from that bottom 5th of income below 25000 are twice as likely as we would expect based on chance to be in the bottom it's very difficult to get out of the bottom. it's a fight every day to meet your needs and the needs of your family. we find some quarter 1000000 of our brothers sisters. parents to have around our heart and a message. our military. more must be done to reduce poverty and dependency and believe me nothing is more important than welfare reform i think

poverty to a large extent is also a state of mind poverty in a sense. how does piloted love. papa didn't have a loan. because he can put make up. the clothes on anything about sometimes if we struggled with poverty in a certain way with him to the most most critical because we say well we didn't i pulled myself up by the stress i got it done i struggled i had to work 2 jobs i did it well your situation is not the same somebody else is because we're individuals and our characteristics our personality our network of people our demographics of the area that we live in are different that we can't take 2 people from different sections and say well this person did it he must be good and this person didn't do it they trained elephant by pound elephant with a little bell when a young. man elephant growth of the bull found them all the elephant.

and put the same little rope around that elephant. but that elephant is a condition only go in far as that rope will let him. have anywhere say wait a minute cases of people as he had a little rope around their mouth. level will only let him go so far. now listen only let him drain. so far and he would children. no need to go up. in the delta. the same little rope gets added a man. that only goes for that rope. most important thing is where you're born and who you're born to so this one guy he said i'll do your study for you he said i grew up in poverty and i said thank you so much i said tell me how did your family get by he said well my father was

a physician he died when i was 12 i had to go live with grandparents i worked in their store i pulled myself up by my own bootstraps i had the right mindset and i was determined and i became a doctor like my dad and i'm listening to him through the eyes of somebody who's bought her 5 brothers in the back window of the car and i'm thinking you knew someone who owned a store and you were related to vote. but if you look at it from his context his experiences who are the children of professional singer. typically it's going to be other children of professionals and what people do is we compare ourselves to the people around us and we sometimes put an umbrella and say poverty is just poverty and that's not that's not true that's not the case it's so difficult to come up with a solution to help someone we don't understand the problem ourselves how can we work together how can we understand each other and the answer is we have to accurately understand poverty what is poverty about.

so understanding the perspectives of people who live in generational poverty or working class poverty or immigrant poverty or situational poverty there's so many different life experiences of poverty and we use one word to describe them all so many people they've they have no idea if you're born into a poor family. born into a minority family if you're born into a family that only has a single parent that really constrains your lives. dances people die on average 15 years younger if you're born into generational poverty. only 17 percent of the people born into generational poverty move out so you move a lot and you just get through the day and a life becomes about getting through the day generational poverty is the deepest

poverty that cycle out of any people in generational poverty are working $1.00 jobs a month to decide between paying for buying food. that's the kind of poverty i come from where most of my family members can't read and write there's high mobility of constantly addicted you're going hungry to have nutrition if you got really really sick you know the images through and you just hope they give you sales. by the prescriptions working class poverty is a little different you're living paycheck to paycheck don't have a lot less dover but know that checks coming so you feel like you have a little more control over their lives but they're very hard on themselves they buy into the idea that if they work or don't make it and they have the labor statistics they without an education or skill or your whole life. and then there's immigrant poverty where you have people who are struggling with housing transportation child nutrition medical care basic human needs and in addition to

that you have the language barriers the cultural barriers the just the discrimination racism to live to really big obstacles to address to really develop to their potential and then you have situational poverty you go up to middle class environment you hear middle class words since you were in the war you know middle class and structure you're not saying you maybe have a divorce and you fall into poverty or maybe you get downsized in your job and you fall into poverty those are the ones that sometimes don't find their way into our numbers that didn't fill out the papers for the free and reduced lunch. in america well i just think that everybody who works hard. a certain amount of talent can make it and can join the middle class that's the american dream and past generations the american dream seem to be working pretty well it's not working as well now we always think that in america on the theory of the land of the brave

equal opportunity. for. kids. to. go to school so. through education you can also better yourselves in other words. you learn how to learn how to think critically and find solutions to unexpected challenges education also teaches you the value of discipline but the greatest rewards come not from instant gratification but from sustained effort. and from hard work. and finally with the right education both at home and at school you can learn how to be

a better human being.

you cannot be both with yeah you like. the money is in my. name because it was a bit. more about. one with more than the side of the. bottom of the symbol. now on the body i'm not one that.

when you look at the landscape of our community one of the things that keeps me up at night is. our education attainment rates 70 percent of our citizens our neighbors that live with us have no post-secondary credential today's economy is very demanding scales and skills means education getting a job these days with just a high school education is a lot harder than it used to be the chances are that you're going to be in poverty or close to be especially if you're trying to support a family. why did 20 different focus groups i did surveys i did interviews expecting to find that students were afraid of which they are that students need more tutoring which they do but those weren't the barriers that students identified that were keeping him from being successful in the classroom what students told me overwhelmingly is the

biggest barriers to their success in the classroom had nothing to do with the classroom transportation childcare health care housing food utility payments to. show that college is a very successful way to go and it's still the best decision for students or anyone who wants to get out of poverty or level up in what they want to do however i also think that the worst thing to do is go to college and drop out years ago the goal is to graduate you've got to graduate but you just can't drop out because unlike anything else you still got to pay the bill.

now what higher ed would do is they would look at those success rates and they would go oh are students aren't as well prepared they're not smart they don't know how to study they're not dedicated and i think what we've learned in emerald colleges those aren't true at all our students are smart they're ambitious they're capable they want for themselves they're burdened not just provide a future for themselves but to save their families but they have real barriers that they bring with them if we're going to fulfill our mission in our education we've got to understand those barriers and address them if we want our students to be successful in the classroom. and i teach people that if you don't get educated you don't get skilled you going to be poor your whole life and so will your children is an absolute exception of the person who is living you know so when i say well my own makes 800000 is not educated including labor statistics and census data that's an exception i didn't know what i wanted to be and so after i graduated from college i think that that's somewhat normal but i went ahead and i i

went to college and i picked the major and i was glad that i had people in my life their courage to me just to go ahead and a lot of people because they've learned they've been. sent messages that they're not smart enough they're not good enough they don't try. to. get your high school diploma gets your college degree and then keep pursuing what it is that you have a skill set for and you're passionate about one of the hardest most heartbreaking things about not having your ged or your high school diploma is sometimes you hit a ceiling at work or you miss an opportunity we don't want you to miss we we want people to have those opportunities in the best due to you know i'm not i asked that in every the lot of those walking around but i graduated man education and you need a plan. one of things i think we're really not

talking about high school students about is this subject that i like to call success we teach english we teach math but we don't teach success which regardless how smart you are in any of those other categories if you understand the subject of success because when he loses basic fundamentals of understanding you know how to network how to communicate will be bold but also how to be strategic realizing what's important. college is down about how smart you are it's about how hard you're willing to work in every case we should exposed to at school that shows the average income of people who drop out of high school and people who graduate from high school but doable for the kids who get a 2 year degree in kids who get a 4 year the when they get to be adults the differences in those levels with education have exploded over the last 3 or 4 decades and if we can show the kids and make them understand and say you know if i get more education i'm going to make more money and that will have an impact on every other part of my life the most

important thing is not the freedom to buy things it's the freedom to dream and chase what you really want to do the more money you can make and now and not spend it it allows you to dream at a place and give you the oxygen in. well you're not thinking short term. thing that i think is so important to understand is how poverty steals your hope. and your confidence i was talking to 2 students at my t. place and i loaded one up on my car brought him over here walk them through the process got him signed up we got a man rolled and then that student told me after we got him a schedule when it came time to go to class for the 1st day he said in his car in his parking lot for 3 hours and he couldn't get out of the car. that's

that's not because he won smart capable or he didn't want to do it that's because he was a brave and. that's real but it can't be an excuse everybody in their lives everyone has fear i just challenge you to work through your fear and don't let fear keep you from being your best self don't give out by yourself when you are educated and when you know the things that you know and you know how hard you work. you need to create the story for yourself you need to surround yourself with other people who are going to be possibility and do not allow negative people negativity to talk you out of your dream. what are you passionate about what you have skills that boy and in the meantime keep pursuing your education you have to understand that you have so much purpose between 14 and 24 that the decisions you

make not only going to pack yourself are going to back your kids and your grandkids you don't even know who's going to benefit from the little decisions you make today you may not see it but your grandkids will definitely see. q an. elite. election. key key. election to election. day was. i watched. that was going to be a singer. and and i'm telling you. from the moment she decided she was going to be a singer. do that really

a little girl at that point and every time i saw her do the work think about it you know this work ethic that she had was if we can amazin i mean you know as a kid authorise thing and all the things and then we we started this church in downtown houston our family joe and brought the kids to an assistant and she joined a choir. and every now and then she'd get a solo and she would put more into that fellow than the whole choir would into the whole 12 and now she is on the largest platform in the world and they would be a thing. all because of a work ethic i'm a young woman who made a decision to what she was going to do and be in life. and allowed no one to get away will everyone be a. no. that's why you got to have a plan

a a plan b. and a plan c. . we have hard workers in this community whether they're students in amarillo college or employees in the community we have a really hard work ethic the issue is they're underemployed so they're working really hard and not making a living wage doing she already is i work in a crisis is $1.00 jobs and still i can't put food and pay rent i have to make a choice so we say you've got to work harder in order to to make it that's not true not when you're experiencing poverty because people in poverty are working. i started looking at who's the number one teacher of poverty in the united states of america and the answer that i found was the media. so what's the average person going to know about poverty and the people who live in it it's probably going to be things like whether getting rich off welfare with a kid in high school is thinking it's not that big a deal as long as i have kids i'll be fine i'll be getting well for all the good

and casual for will be covered by medicaid i can get housing and so. it doesn't happen that way in 1906 my welfare check before going any dollars me jennifer was 6 daniels to my 15 year old homeless cuz i was living with me and they said we won't help her because she's not yours we'll give you $400.00 my rent in a neighborhood. in portland oregon was 395. have been to the man a welfare check today her family of 3 national average or 78 that's 196-2000 17 the average rent according to had a modest apartment 750. the average disability check is $0.70 it's almost impossible to get out of poverty based just on public. our labor statistics say if you take a minimum wage job and you work 10 years and you don't have education beyond high

school you don't have a skill like an electrician or plumber the average increase after working hard for 10 years in a person's income is $2.00 an hour didn't matter how hard you were big about it who works harder the person cleaning the hotel room or the person in their office you don't move up without a skill or an education so if you want to buy your mama house want to make sure your kids don't go hungry can't get a skill got a good education now if you want to on say start all that 30000 a year and have the possibility or up to 60 or 70000 you know who have to have skills you have to be talented you have to know how to do you need what we call soft skills and hard skills parts skills are just you know being technically trained to do something computer literacy anybody who. goes through school these days and isn't computer literate is going to be in trouble and i think our schools should be doing a lot more if they're not already to teach people programming and coding skills and the whole set of things you can't get

a decent job anymore if you don't have those skills either the soft skills and if you talk to employers employers will tell you that they're really missing the soft skills as much as the hard skills the soft skills are things like getting to work on tall i'm dressing appropriately knowing how to interact with other people knowing how to be polite with a client or a customer knowing how to rob them solved knowing what to do when something doesn't go quite right you know being a bit creative. one of the things that helped me in my personal life was to see other people maybe of my same skin color or or city and and see them succeed so it becomes attainable you don't know what you don't know and i think a lot of times is that's what i think holding people back in poverty they don't know it's bigger than their town and they don't know what they can do bigger than what they see on t.v. and the people they see at school and of people that their parents are. used to

work in elementary schools and yes the kids what they want to be in life and they want to be doctors and anna in a lawyer but if your home life doesn't support the teen ability of those things. it's a nice dream but it's not a reality in certain groupings neighborhoods don't have that exposure so it's important that our schools our community kind of blend itself in and expose especially the youngest kids to that. problem drugs has come from unscrupulous dealers from pharmacies to in every state in the united states we've seen a very. the sharp increase in the number of people seeking treatment for addiction to prescription opioids. invaded america under the banner of medicine persisted with the pain that instead of trying to wean him off though she did go so if your

dose after dose if your dose and really became his drug dealer who's to blame patients doctors manufacturers it's. 54 jets and more than 1300 military personnel are headed to air force base in alaska where is that to say come on i'll show you what's the reason for any type of enhanced u.s. military presence in this area rush up. what is it suddenly about the south china sea that makes it so that it 11000000000 barrels of oil. take a look at this map who really owns what kind of says no it belongs to us india says no we claim that that belongs to us both of these countries have nuclear weapons

capabilities there is reason for concern so that's why we're going to drill down on this story for you today right here on the news or direction chaz where you know as we always like to say we do believe by golly it's time to do news again. during the vietnam war u.s. forces. are in laos it was a secret war. and for years the american people did not know. how much it is especially the. country per capita. millions of unexploded bombs still in danger lives in this small agricultural country. so i mean we don't think it's happening. even today kids in laos full victims of bombs dropped decades ago is the u.s. making amends for that tragedy and what help do the people need in that little land

of mine. rejects britain's claims of hiking medical files the u.k. foreign say described as almost certain meddling in last year's general election we asked people in london for their thoughts. sometimes i think these things will distract all people just a smokescreen you know just to you know distract us from what's really going on i don't think it's productive to make her shrink i'd rather be blaming cummings before i blame groceries. and also ahead in the hour the us register.