About a month ago, I had the opportunity to spend a weekend at Harvard with a group of about 20 scholars and reporters. Many of them have worked for decades examining poverty-related issues—from hiring discrimination to segregation in housing and education, criminal justice reform to immigration, deep poverty to homelessness.
I was nervous about the trip. The combination of the venue—and the fact that I had long-admired many of the participants—led me to double-check the invite to make sure I was the intended recipient. For sure, I was the guy. So, even though my mother insisted that I needed new shoes to set foot on that campus, I packed my scuffed-up loafers with their separating soles and flew to Boston.
I’m not sure exactly what I expected, but it wasn’t this.
Read Full Article »