Unarmored Talk

Years of Adversity and Doubt: The Moment Everything Changed

• Dr. Jennifer James • Episode 106

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Have you ever encountered a life story so compelling it unfolds like an epic novel, where daunting hurdles are masterfully transformed into pathways of triumph?

Meet Dr. Jennifer James, the visionary Principal of Innovation Early College High School in Greenville, North Carolina, and the distinguished 2023 Pitt County Schools Principal of the Year.

Today, Dr. James candidly shares her journey, illuminating the dark shadows cast by her parent's divorce and the stark challenge of growing up without emotional support, leading up to the pivotal moment that changed everything!

In this 'unarmored' conversation, she reveals how overcoming these personal trials shaped her and fueled her innovative leadership and compassionate approach to education. Dr. James' story is a powerful reminder that the foundation of a brighter future for the next generation is often laid by the vision and care of just one individual.

As you listen, consider: Who has been that 'one person who cares' in your life, and how have you transformed adversity into your pathway of triumph?

Guest Links:
Watch on YouTube - https://youtu.be/_7s1tRZ0qfI
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-james-edd-68691630/
2023 Pitt County Schools Principal of the Year Article - https://www.stillservinginc.com/jenniferjames

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Mario P. Fields:

Welcome back to unarmor talk podcast. Thank you so much for listening and watching each episode and continue pleased to share with your friends and family members and colleagues, and don't forget to leave a rating or review if you feel this is a awesome show. And you can connect to all of my social media on the parade deck Just look in a show notes or you can put in the search engine Mario P Fields parade deck and get all access To my social media. Well, let's get ready to interview another guest who is willing to remove their armor to help other people? Welcome back to unarmor talk podcast. Everyone, I'm still your host, mario P Fields. Unless I get fired by myself, I guess I can fire. I don't know how that works. You guys can fire me. You guys are the audience, the listeners and viewers, or you can say Mario, you're horrible, you need to go away. But thank you.

Mario P. Fields:

Before we get to an amazing guest, I say that every episode with this one's a little different. Everyone, doctor, jennifer James, just so you guys know, she is the principal of innovation early college, high school. She is the one that allowed me to build the concept of still serving incorporated around that school in 2018. And every time you share, watch you like, you subscribe, you make a comment and all those those terrible dollars that have been generated from my youtube channel and the Apple podcast and listen notes and all the audio stuff. They all been pretty much donated to support what dr James and her team is doing in Pitt County, north Carolina. If it wasn't for you, dr James, I don't believe still serving would be where it's at. Dr James, welcome to the show.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Thank you. Thank you and thank you for the the positive comments. We've definitely worked together the last six years and I've grown and you've grown, and our organizations have grown too. So it's been, it's been pretty awesome.

Mario P. Fields:

Oh yeah, she didn't even have students everyone. I, you know, I didn't even have a website and dr James, you have students. I'm like, hey, money for built this and I'm in California and she took a chance on me. So so, again, thank you, but everyone, she is the again the principal of innovation. Early college high school. She stood that school up from scratch in 2018. It is a partnership between Pitt County schools and East Carolina University. Go Pirates, go purple and go baby, if we are a pirate family here in the fields household. And Again, don't forget to share, subscribe, leave some comments. Let's keep going to year number 24. You know what I mean. Let's do this forever, if we can. Let's get right to our amazing guests. Dr James, can you please tell the listeners and viewers just a little bit about yourself?

Dr. Jennifer James:

sure, dr Jennifer James. I, as Mario said, I am the principal innovation early college high school. I've been here this is my sixth year and I did start it from scratch. We're a partnership with East Carolina University but I am a Pitt County school employee. I have been with Pitt County schools oh, I think 16, 16 years. I am in my 11th year as a principal.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Prior to that I was an assistant principal at a high school North Pitt high school, which is real close to where I live and like the rural part of Pitt County schools, and before that I was an exceptional children's teacher.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I taught students in special education program in the occupational courts of study, so students that had mild to moderate intellectual disabilities or had severe emotional behaviors. So I did that for four and a half years and Before that I was in the business world, so I did not come to teaching directly through college. I have a degree in management information systems, so a business administration Degree with a focus and management information systems. And then when I went back to school To get my MSA, so Masters in School Administration, it was through the principal fellow program, so it was a scholarship program. So I went back to school, got my MSA and then just recently last May finished my doctoral program. So have my doctorate in school administration, curriculum and instruction and also have my superintendent's license. And all three of those degrees are from East Carolina University, so I'm a pirate at heart. All my education has been through ECU, so I'm very familiar with the campus and the culture of East Carolina University.

Mario P. Fields:

Well, you know everyone. You're hearing all these amazing accomplishments and, oh, by the way, in 2023, dr James was out of a large group of principals in Pitt County. Dr James was selected as the 2023 Pitt County School as teacher, I mean, I'm sorry principal of the year. So you're hearing all these accomplishments, but let's jump into the journey. From my basic understanding, dr James, from childhood, you had a lot of things stacked against you. Per se that it was your resilience and some other things that allow that created these opportunities. Talk to us a little bit about that, beginning in Wade County.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Sure. So I have an older sister. Her name is Nicole, she's four years older than me, and then it was myself. My parents were together until I was six years old. So what? In the best relationship between them.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Growing up so I don't feel like I ever really saw what a loving, happy marriage should look like. I didn't grow up in that type of environment. So at six years old they got divorced. We had to decide where to go and it was a bit of a forced decision.

Dr. Jennifer James:

My mom God rest her soul she died about 11 years ago. I always say she did the best she could with what she had and it took me a very long time to get to that place right, probably maybe in my 40s before I could get to the place to say that. But growing up she just didn't really know how to be a very loving, comforting, emotionally available mother, and so when it came time for the divorce to happen, it was almost like an ultimatum was given to my older sister that we had to go with her. We couldn't go with my dad, so we ended up going with my mom, and so mental, emotional, physical abuse ensued from the time I was I don't I can't really remember exactly when it started, because when you go through trauma like that, you tend to block out a lot of things, like it falls into a dark abyss. But some of my earliest memories were, you know, emotional, mental or physical abuse from my mom.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So we ended up at six going with her and stayed with her for a while and then, like a lot of kids in divorced families, you end up going back and forth I don't like it here, I'm gonna go to my dad's, I don't like it here, he has too many roles and going back to my mom's. So I did that for a bit until I just at 12 years old I think I really realized what was happening with my mom and it just was not a safe space. You know, on top of not being able to be emotionally available, she was an alcoholic as well. So that contributed to a lot of what was going on with her. So she'd get drunk pretty much every night and we would be exposed to that.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So at 12, I decided you know what, I'm gonna stay settled with my dad. So by eighth grade, which is when I was 12 years old, I had moved 11 times between her and my dad, and then she moved to locks. We got evicted out of houses Frequently. She lived paycheck to paycheck, you know. So it was just a difficult time for sure. So I stayed with my dad, went to a new school in middle school Fuqua Verena and eighth grade, ninth grade 10th grade were very difficult for me because I was the new kid on the block right. All of the kids had been together really since kindergarten, and here comes this new girl.

Mario P. Fields:

Here she comes.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Yep. So I got picked on a lot girls and boys and that ensued into high school some. So it was just really hard for me to find my group because I felt like I was an outsider and my self-esteem and self-confidence was already so destroyed because of how I grew up. Right, I lived with your stupid in the back of my mind for forever, like I can remember, and so now you've got kids your age picking on you, giving you a hard time, and so you're further believing the negative things that are going on in your mind and that have been said to you prior to. So, yeah, fast forward, graduated high school and I had some friends and they were awesome, went to actually went to ECU with one of my good friends, had a great time in college. Like college is where I really started to bloom and kind of find myself Really shouldn't have gotten into college. My SAT score is so low I won't tell people the score, like I'm that embarrassed by it right.

Mario P. Fields:

Let me say you got the results back in. It was negative 30.

Dr. Jennifer James:

It wasn't negative 30, but it was low. So I'm surprised that any college accepted me. But ECU did. They accepted me. So it was the first school to accept me. So I was like I'm out of here.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I came to ECU and ended up majoring in business, found my group of friends, found a really great partner, boyfriend that I was with for several years and he helped me understand about like going inside and doing the work of like figuring out what had gone on in my life and, you know, turned me on to some different self help books and things like that. So I started discovering like, oh yeah, I've got some stuff I need to deal with. So that was my first awakening to knowing that I had things to deal with. So that was in college. I actually moved in with my mother after I graduated college because I didn't have a job, I didn't have anywhere to go, I didn't know what I was gonna do. So that was really interesting. So I hadn't lived with her, I'd gone and seen her, but we were kind of estranged for a while. So when I'm 20, 21, yeah, it took me six and a half years to graduate college, but I graduated.

Mario P. Fields:

And that's with the bachelors.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Yeah, I changed my major a couple of times and I paid for my own school. So I worked jobs, I paid for my own college, actually paid off those loans in 2018, it took forever, but anyway, but yeah. So I think, because I paid for it on my own, I changed my major, I was working. It just took me a bit longer to graduate, but I graduated right. But I went back and lived with her and stayed with her for a couple of months and being an adult and seeing all of the things. She wasn't as emotionally and mentally abusive she definitely wasn't physically abusive at that point but she just wasn't available right. She just wasn't mom material not what I would have sought out in a mom right. And so I had an opportunity to move to San Francisco and my first thought was I have to get as far away from these people as I possibly can, and so I packed my car it was $700 and drove across country $700 to San Fran.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Like you're buying some groceries and that's it right? Yeah, so I went there and stayed there for a year, went to Florida for a year, just enjoyed seeing the world, traveled some, getting different perspectives from different people. And then I met my husband and that's where everything really shifted for me. I ended up coming back to Eastern North Carolina. I thought I'd never come back here, but that's where he was from. We've been married 20 years. This past April was 20 years. Congratulations, thank you.

Dr. Jennifer James:

He was the person that believed in me so hard, like no one has ever believed in me the way that Bert James has, and he helped me understand the potential that I had, although it might have been buried deep down because I couldn't see it right, because I have all of these negative thoughts like, oh, you can't do that, or you're not smart enough, or that's not something you could do.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I had all the negative loops going on in my brain, but he helped me understand the power that I had within me and that I could be whatever I wanted to be, and so he just spoke life over me. He's done it for 20 years. This was at 27. That I met him and he started doing that, and so I came around to like fully believing it into my 30s and I mean I really I don't know say, hold him responsible, but he's really responsible for how I view myself now. So we got into church, you know, and so I became more connected. I had been to church on and off throughout my life but like definitely more connected to God and understanding, like that whole relationship and then just knowing that I have somebody that's in my corner and believes in me.

Mario P. Fields:

And you know what's interesting, Dr James, you know listening to you and tell, and first of all, I applaud again your amazing husband, and I don't just say congratulations like it's a check in the box for 20 years of matrimony. I've done some research. People being married is not common these days, it's for that long.

Mario P. Fields:

But what's cool for me getting to know you and having discussions without armor today on this show, how I see you show those students at Innovation Early College High School that all they need is one person to believe in them. And I've seen you. I've seen you do it, but I never knew the background behind it, and it's cool to see how you went through your journey and how you found one person, that one person that, from their heart, believed in you, and how I can see it as a spectator and a bleachers watching you pour that back in. What. How many students have come through Innovation Early College since 2018? I want four or 500? I don't know. You know what's the list, yeah.

Dr. Jennifer James:

I've got 200 and I've got 218 now and we've had two groups of students graduate and about 45 in each group.

Mario P. Fields:

Yeah, so a few hundred, and so I just wanted pause real quick, because that's just impressive how you had a choice right. You could have used your upbringing as a crutch the divorce and everything, the emotional negative energy, the faucet, the low self-esteem. You could have chose not to self-reflect. You can say you know what this is life, these are the curves that were dealt to me, that metaphor, and so therefore, I'm just gonna be just like everyone else in my family. You know what I mean? Oh man, wow.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I don't know at what point I began thinking this might have been in college, a little bit after but I knew I wanted to break the generational curse, right? So my mom's father wasn't the best to her, his mother wasn't the best to him, and who knows how far it went back. I don't know my whole story because I'm not, you know that, super connected with my family, like that, but there's a generational cycle, right? So at some point I knew I wanted to break the generational cycle. It's so important. Like I did not wanna abuse my child so I did not.

Dr. Jennifer James:

I worked super hard to take care of my son, who's now 14 and he's a fantastic kid and he knows he's loved. You know, he's just a total different experience than what I had. But that thought of breaking negative cycles is a huge part of what we do at Innovation Early College High School. It's part of our belief statement that the staff decided, you know, I thought it was great because it's what I wanted them to decide, but they decided on their own that they felt like it was really important to teach our kids how to break negative cycles.

Dr. Jennifer James:

And that can be a generational cycle, it can be a negative thought pattern in your brain right, I'm not a good math student, I'll never be a good math student, I've never done math well. And then you come here and you start doing math well, so you break that cycle. So tons of examples of what that could look like. But that's a huge part of what we do here is working to break these negative cycles that our students have come accustomed to through what just life you know, through home life, through school life, social life, internet, social media. You know they're just a lot of negative cycles that they go through. Yeah, it's a huge part of what we do. And I do believe if you can have one person in your corner to cheer you on and to help you see yourself in a way that maybe you've never thought you could see yourself so like positive way of seeing myself that discuss the limit, and so that's right. That's what I do for my kids, because I know the power in that.

Mario P. Fields:

And Dr James, I see it and you know. So the interesting thing is you guys heard earlier, you know you weren't always in education. You know you had a business degree, kind of did business. So here you are, in your thirties, you meet this amazing, amazing man. By the way, next day, if I ever get a chance to see him in person, I'm going to make sure I give him some nice beverages and red carpet seven star. I give him a massage to. You know, take care of them. But here you are in your thirties and you got kind of this business focus. And at what point did you switch from this business industry to students education?

Dr. Jennifer James:

Yeah, so back up just a little bit. So when I was at ECU, I took some education classes and then I turned 21 and I just I was not ready. I knew I was like I'm not ready to influence kids right now. Right, I was at ECU, which was one of the top party schools, according to Playboy, so you know, 21, it just wasn't time. So that's when I changed my major to business. But I've always had it in the back of my mind and never knew I'd come back to it. I had a friend who was an assistant principal at Southwest Edgecom and he knew that background. Right, they were looking for an exceptional children's teacher and at the time, oh, I was running a pizza restaurant. Jesus help me. Love for all the people running restaurants is a hard job.

Mario P. Fields:

Hold on, dr James. You was running a see, that's why I like this show man. You was running a pizza restaurant.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Yeah so.

Mario P. Fields:

I should change the title.

Dr. Jennifer James:

My father-in-law and his two brothers. They were in the farming industry and it was um around the time that the tobacco buyout was happening and so they wanted a way to diversify their portfolio because tobacco buyout right, that was their huge you know crop that they were growing. So they decided to buy a pizza restaurant and they knew I had a business background. So before that I was renting cars in a press rent a car. So my business degree did a lot for me at that time. So I was like, yeah, I'm pretty done renting cars. So, yeah, I'll try it. I'd worked in the restaurant industry. You know, all through college I never managed a restaurant but I thought, with my business degree and customer service goes, I could do it right. So I did it for a year.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Very difficult job Kudos to anyone that does it because you are always on call, somebody doesn't show up, you have to go, you're dealing with the customers. I mean it's just constant, constant and you smell like pizza all the time. Right, I mean I had a separate drawer for my clothes because they smelled so bad. It didn't matter how many times you washed them, you smelled like pizza all the time. But that's beside the point.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I was doing that and my friend was, like, aren't you sure you know, you sure you don't want to do education? I was like, well, let me pray about it, because I knew working with exceptional children had its own challenges outside of teaching. Teaching is challenging anyway, but I knew that that was could be challenging too. So I prayed about and prayed about it and decided it was the right move. So I went, got the job under an emergency certification so I wasn't even certified to be a teacher. So I went back to school while I was learning to teach, got my certification in a year and a half to be a teacher from, I think it was, edgecom Community College, classes there and classes at ECU, so got my certification to be an exceptional children's teacher while I was teaching. So it was a friend that knew I had some classes and went out on a limb and was like we really need a teacher and I think that you might do good. I did and that was the start of my teaching career.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I stayed with him for a year and a half and then went to North Pitt.

Mario P. Fields:

You know the power of a network, the power of people in your network, just a variety, like a mutual fund, a variety of people in your network that can really propel you to things that you didn't even think about or maybe you considered. And from that point to 2023, pitt County Schools principle of the year roughly. Do you know how many principles? I don't even know how roughly. I mean a rough number of how many principles.

Dr. Jennifer James:

There, I think there's 36 of us in Pitt County, and so you get nominated from the pool.

Mario P. Fields:

The 36 principles yeah, what an amazing journey. You know, dr James, I know you are doing amazing things at Innovation Early College High School today and you know you and our partners. Anyway, I will talk to you forever without even realizing what time it is. But you guys, you guys heard from Dr James. I wish we had more time, but you guys know how the show goes. I don't like to take too much time from the guests who are having fun doing the things they love. If you, looking back, if you had to give one tip to any student any anyone that is in a situation where their self-esteem is low, maybe the environment is not conducive, you know, maybe they just don't believe in themselves because there's no one in their corner. If you will, what piece of advice could you give them?

Dr. Jennifer James:

Wow, that's a big question. I mean I want to say, find somebody that's in your corner that can help you see the goodness that you have. But sometimes it's hard to find that person right Like. You might not have that person. It might not be a friend or anyone at school or in your family.

Dr. Jennifer James:

So I think something that you could do is really think about what are the positive things that you have going for yourself, because everybody has positive things going for themselves. It could be, you know, in relation to your health and wellness and exercising. It could be you're kind to other people. It could be I'm good at math. You know whatever the things are that you are good at and I think you write those down, you put you know, you develop affirmations from that, put them on your mirror and you start speaking that to yourself I'm good at math, I'm a great mathematician, my math skills will help me in the future.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Or I'm kind to people, I am compassionate, people are compassionate to me and so I think when you start speaking positivity over your own self and your own life, you're gonna manifest more of the positivity. So if you don't have someone else, that's helping you do that, that's helping speak that positivity to you. You got to generate it on your own. You've got to dig deep, peel back the layers. You can find one positive thing about yourself. I absolutely promise you can and you put it on a note, stick it on your mirror and you speak it to yourself every day, and then more positivity will start coming to your mind about yourself. So I think that's the piece of advice that I would give someone. You have to be the conduit and you have to start speaking kindly to yourself.

Mario P. Fields:

Dr James, I love it. I mean, I'm just listening to you and this is reminding me of when I was even growing up in school and I didn't grow man. I'm like, why is everyone growing but me? Like you said, you made me self reflect on this show. I had to start thinking Mario, it's okay to be short, you're better. Look at your smile. So whatever, dr James, you guys heard the tips. I love it. Everything starts with you. Start find things about yourself, fall in love with yourself if you will, and speaking it to existence. I love how you said write it down everyone. Write it down. Research has proven that if you write things down, you increase the probability of success and achieving your own goals. Thank you so much for coming on the show. I appreciate you and everyone. If you guys wanna read the article, go on to wwwsteelservinginccom latest news and there's a wonderful article that our team put together in regards to Dr James in her prestigious award that she got last October. Dr James, please be safe, it will be in contact soon, okay.

Dr. Jennifer James:

Okay, thank you so much for the opportunity. I really appreciate it.

Mario P. Fields:

Thank you so much, where everyone you guys know the deal. God bless you, god bless your families and God bless your friends. We'll see you guys in a couple of weeks. Bye, bye, dr James. Thank you for listening to this most recent episode and remember you can listen and watch all of the previous episodes on my YouTube channel. The best way to connect to me and all of my social media is follow me on the Parade Deck, that is wwwparadedeckcom, or you can click on the link in the show notes. I'll see you guys soon.

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