Gian Paul Gonzalez, 07年

2007年的Gian Paul Gonzalez并没有把时间浪费在局限上. Gian Paul is an educator of high school students from his home city of Union City, New Jersey as well as high school students across the state and has also been an adjunct professor to graduate students seeking their master’s degrees in education. In addition, he is managing a successful career as a motivational speaker and as founder of a community-based youth initiative. With a schedule like his, Gonzalez is determined to make every minute count.

When Gonzalez, 她刚从十大博彩推荐排名大学毕业，是一年级的历史老师, was invited to offer words of inspiration to the New York Giants in December 2011, 他抓住了这个机会. 他那臭名昭著的"全力以赴"演讲, Gonzalez motivated some of the country’s most elite athletes to turn their season around and win the 2012 NFL Super Bowl.

这很容易让人想起冈萨雷斯的演讲, 以及随之而来的全国认可, 作为命运的幸运转折. But doing so would ignore the level of dedication this educator and community advocate pours into everything he does – whatever the circumstances.

“我是一名高中运动员, 所以我在研究大学的时候自然想到了体育运动,” he says. “I started out at Pennsylvania’s Messiah University, which offered me a basketball scholarship. It was a good experience, but the coach who recruited me was let go at the end of the first year. 我感觉它不再适合我了.”

冈萨雷斯访问了几所大学, and learned that in most cases transferring meant sitting out of his favorite activity for a spell until he could be integrated into the team. “My mom and uncle, also Montclair graduates, suggested I consider their alma mater,” he recalls. “Coach Ted Fiore, 当时的篮球总教练, invited me to his team and said that I could start playing as soon as I enrolled. 我非常想参加比赛，但我的决定并没有那么简单. Fiore said he’d like to have me on the team as a player, and also as a person. 这是第一次有教练这样对我说话. 我真的很感激.”

冈萨雷斯的教授们也采用了这种方法. “他们尊重我这个人，”他说. “他们提出具有挑战性的问题，指导我如何做决定. 我学会了如何有自己的目标和信念.”

冈萨雷斯确实保持着开放的心态，因为他尝试了各种专业. “All I knew at the time was that I wanted to serve and give back to others,” he says. “我尝试过社会学、社会工作、人类学. 然后我上了迈克尔·惠兰教授的历史课. 他让每节课都感觉像是在看电影. I was hooked.”

“十大博彩推荐排名是一个允许自由的社区, 以及鼓励和支持, to explore,冈萨雷斯继续说道. “For example, gym space was limited, so Coach Fiore offered to open the gym for me at 5:00 a.m. 让我练习一下我的技能. 我的导师鼓励我参加NCAA领导会议, 是什么让我认识了来自全国各地的球员. I still use some of the team-building exercises that I learned at that conference.”

Gonzalez’s eye for opportunity and passion for giving back sparked a new way of thinking in his senior year when an assistant coach asked him to play as a fill-in for a celebrity all-star game. “比赛结束后，孩子们都来找我要签名，”他说. “我开始思考体育在人们生活中的力量.”

Soon, 冈萨雷斯向曾经和他一起打球的运动员伸出了援手, and against, during his college years to invite them to play basketball with youth at an Essex County juvenile detention facility. “我们一起打球，吃披萨，”他说. “These are simple things that we often take for granted, but I saw how much it meant to these kids.”

这些拜访变得更加定期，并在他毕业后继续进行, 引起了乔治·麦戈文的注意. McGovern, 他当时是纽约巨人队的牧师, heard about the work Gonzalez was doing playing basketball with justice-involved youth at New Jersey juvenile facilities. 当一个团队预定的演讲者取消了, McGovern reached out to the basketball player he saw bringing so much hope to troubled youth.

当冈萨雷斯谈到他作为NFL发言人的时刻时，他深思熟虑. “It seems like things came fast, but really, everything happens with the proper timing,” he says. “随着时间的推移，建立关系有很大关系.”

At times, it seemed that the relationships and timing were right, but the goal itself didn’t compute. “我从十大博彩推荐排名州立大学毕业后, 我有机会参加NBA联合训练,” Gonzalez says. “因为我从大一开始就和我的教练保持联系, 是谁训练了犹他爵士队的格雷格·奥登和迈克·康利, he trained me for the NBA Combine and I was chosen from the summer roster in Los Angeles. 我正朝着职业篮球的方向发展.”

然而，《十大博彩推荐排名》对冈萨雷斯来说并不理想. “I couldn’t get past the desire to make a difference in my home city,” he says.

Gonzalez began making a difference by teaching world history to 9th graders in Union City. 然而，他敏锐的眼睛又一次发现了别人忽略的一个细节. “我注意到社区里几乎没有课外活动, 也没有一家营业到深夜, 当我们社区发生大多数犯罪的时候,” he says.

That observation manifested into Hope + Future, an afterschool health and wellness program. 与教师和学校管理人员携手合作, 希望+未来是在教学生如何领导, 然后为他们提供这样做的机会. More than 2,200 student members have participated in the Hope + Future Youth Community Center programs since the organization opened its doors in 2015.

Hope + Future draws students in through its focus on sports, but it doesn’t stop there. “We recently received a competitive state grant award for an anti-gang violence program and another grant will enable us to open a café that will train youth to become baristas,” Gonzalez adds, 注意到后一个程序源于他自己对咖啡的热爱. “Accreditation as a barista is a marketable trade that can take you around the world, if you want.”

Yet another grant will help purchase a sound-proof pod that will serve as a home for cognitive-behavioral programs. Every Hope + Future program is developed with the community’s needs in mind and – importantly – Gonzalez is cultivating the organization’s next generation of leaders from within, 以确保它在他自己参与之后也能蓬勃发展.

当冈萨雷斯被邀请代表十大博彩推荐排名 The College Tour, a TV series streaming on Amazon Prime Video that helps students and families virtually visit colleges across the country, 他抓住了这个机会.

“在国家舞台上看到十大博彩推荐排名真是太令人兴奋了，”他说. “十大博彩推荐排名就在这里，随时准备为你提供优质的大学教育. 对于运动员来说, 十大博彩推荐排名可能是三级学校, but you can still give it Division I effort and get so much out of the experience.”

Gonzalez, 谁入选了学校的体育名人堂, 也抽出时间与教育机会基金(EOF)的学生交谈. In fact, some of the graduating EOF students he spoke with this past spring remembered him from his visit to them in 2017, 当他们刚刚开始他们的大学之旅. “I assured them that they might be the first in their families to go to college, 但他们不会是最后一批,” he says, adding that as a Cuban American he is especially pleased to see the University’s increased outreach to the Hispanic community.

他在全国各地巡回演讲，给予鼓励, 冈萨雷斯喜欢向观众讲述十大博彩推荐排名的故事. 他说:“我在十大博彩推荐排名大学的时光激励着我去追求伟大的梦想。. “这是一个我喜欢分享的故事. The University has created an atmosphere that values students as individuals, which in turn gave me the courage to bring people together to make the community better.”

“When we work together, when we throw a line to each other, we begin a new cycle,” he says. “Walk with purpose and you will be surprised at how many people are willing to walk alongside you. 在付出你的全部时，你会感到平静. 你会激励你周围的人，大门也会为你敞开. 你会走得比你想象的更远.”