Project Description

Harvard University is about 1,300 miles from Smokey City, the dodgy North Memphis neighborhood where Dr. Christina Rosenthal grew up dodging roaches, drug dealers and sexual predators.

“When I wanted to go somewhere else, or be somebody else, I’d open an encyclopedia,” said Rosenthal, 35, who learned what to avoid and how to adapt and adjust on her way to becoming Northside High’s valedictorian in 1996.

“Harvard was never on my radar.”

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