Today’s Project 100 memory comes from Yvonne Folkes-Randall.  She was born in Hackensack, New Jersey.  Both of her parents immigrated from Jamaica and moved to Hackensack as young adults.  Her mother was a nurse’s aide.  Her father had several jobs over his working life.  Among the places he worked were Fuji Film, the Bergen Record newspaper, Englewood hospital, and Bio-Reference Laboratories.  She has four brothers.  She was the first person in her family to get a Bachelor’s degree.  She went to public schools and graduated from Hackensack High School in 1998.  She began at Rowan in August of 1998.  After graduating from Rowan in 2002 and having won the Medallion Award for African American Studies, she began seeking a job in public history.  In order to pay the bills, however, she began substitute teaching and fell in love with teaching.  She has had a number of teaching jobs over the years in private and public schools until the pandemic and Covid led her to leave teaching to take of her children.  She has two girls, currently aged eight and four. 

*****

When I was looking at colleges, I mostly wanted to study outside of New Jersey, but I did apply to Rowan as it was far enough away from where I grew up.  I got into several schools, but Rowan admitted me contingent on my taking a summer program. I am not sure why this impacted me, but I somehow took it as a challenge and wanted to go to Rowan to show that they should have admitted me straight away.

The summer program was the Pre-College Institute (PCI), and it was one of the best experiences that I could have had.  Before the semester even began, I already felt so connected and prepared.  In addition to getting college requirements for college classes completed before the Fall, I knew the campus, knew faculty members, and had made many friends.  It was an awesome time, and I later returned to the program and helped history professor Gary Hunter.  It was a full circle experience for me, helping that year’s first-year students. 

I began at Rowan thinking that I would be a business major, but I ended up taking a lot of history classes just because I liked them.  When it was time to declare a major, it was an easy decision to major in history.  I eventually added a concentration in International Studies and one in African American Studies.  I loved the History Department.  I remember, however, being very intimidated by Dr. Carrigan’s Historical Methods class during his first year, so much that I dropped his class the first time.  However, I ended up taking it again a year later.  It worked out better that way, and he became a mentor to me.  I was always in Dr. Hunter’s office, trying to get him to stop smoking.  He was a father-figure to me in many ways, and I took all his classes.  He meant so much to me that for many years after he passed, I gave money to the Hunter Scholarship fund until my daughters demanded all of my extra cash.  

Other faculty members that really helped me included Melissa Klapper.  I loved her Urban History class even though she was, like Dr. Carrigan, very demanding.  I remember Dr. Applebaum helping me prepare to study abroad until September 11^th happened and ended that plan.  Dr. Wiltenburg was so sweet to me, and I enjoyed studying women’s history with her.  I remember having a great class in Modern Japanese history with Dr. Wang.  All in all, I had a great time as a history major and proudly joined the history honors society, Phi Alpha Theta.

Outside of the classroom, Rowan was great as well.  In addition to many friends that I made, I met my husband, Daniel Randall.  He had been in the PCI program the year before me, but he had a friend in my cohort of PCI.  I got to know his friend during that first summer when he tried to cut my laundry time short one day.  He then wanted to introduce me to his friend, Daniel.  I resisted, but I then kept on running into Daniel on campus.  It felt like destiny, so I relented, and we went on a first date.  We have been together even since, now a quarter century.  We had many things in common but one of them was Dr. Lee Kress.  Even though he was a psychology major, he loved Dr. Kress’s United States history survey.  Of course, I talked to Dr. Kress often in the history suite.

I absolutely loved my time at Rowan.  It was my first time being independent.  At home, my younger brother had autism.  I had to spend a lot of time taking care of him because my parents worked so much.   I don’t regret taking care of my brother, and I am very proud of all that he has done in his life.  However, being at Rowan was a liberating time for me. I was able to do a lot of things that I never imagined I would be able to do.  I joined so many groups, made so many friends, and had such deep connections with the faculty.   It was a great experience for me both inside and outside the classroom.   

*****

This is part of the Department of History’s “Project 100,” the collection and sharing of one hundred memories by Glassboro State College and Rowan University alumni and staff in celebration of the 100^th anniversary of the founding of Glassboro Normal School, later Glassboro State College, and now Rowan University.  Thanks to Laurie Lahey for helping proofread and edit the final versions.  Email carrigan@rowan.edu with questions or corrections.  You can find the Link to all of the Project 100 entries on the Web:  https://chss.rowan.edu/departments/history/alumni_highlights/project_100/