Speaker 1: George.
Speaker 2: I'm a homegirl that knows a little bit about everything
Speaker 2: and everybody.
Speaker 1: You don't know if you don't lie about that. Right, Hey, y'all,
Speaker 1: what's up.
Speaker 2: It's Lauren de Rosa and this is the latest with
Speaker 2: Lauren de Rosa.
Speaker 1: This is your.
Speaker 2: Daily dig on all things pop culture, entertainment, news, and
Speaker 2: all of the conversations that shake the room. Now, this
Speaker 2: episode is extra special. I would say that this is
Speaker 2: an exclusive, but it's even more than that. So today
Speaker 2: I'm taking you guys on a journey with me back
Speaker 2: to my HBCU, my alma mater, Delaware State University. I'll
Speaker 2: be speaking at a ceremony called convocation. Now, the ceremony
Speaker 2: is the welcome ceremony that sets the tone for all
Speaker 2: of the freshmen and incoming transfer students, and you know
Speaker 2: a lot of the students of the student body who
Speaker 2: just need that extra word and push to get through
Speaker 2: their semesters. Super crazy because I remember being at my
Speaker 2: convocation and wondering what was going to happen, when it
Speaker 2: was going to happen, and how it was going to happen.
Speaker 1: Now we are here.
Speaker 2: Started from the bottom, Now we're here. So take a listen.
Speaker 2: To some of the ceremony.
Speaker 1: Enjoy.
Speaker 2: You know, if you guys are online just having a
Speaker 2: conversation about anything, inspo, anything Black College, anything, HBCU Pride,
Speaker 2: remember this conversation and include this conversation because this is
Speaker 2: exactly what the full circle of the HBCU alumni.
Speaker 1: Life or world looks like.
Speaker 2: You go, you leave, you come back, you motivate, you inspire,
Speaker 2: and you just learning to help in hand.
Speaker 1: Enjoy.
Speaker 2: Lauren is a proud alumna of Delaware State University, and
Speaker 2: we couldn't be more proud to welcome her home. Thank
Speaker 2: you y'alln and got me emotional. I ain't even said
Speaker 2: a couple words yet. Good morning, everybody, How are you guys?
Speaker 2: Y'all gotta wake up a bit. I'm the pregame queen.
Speaker 1: Good morning everybody. How y'all feeling this morning?
Speaker 2: So my name is Laurena Rosa. You know, I am
Speaker 2: so honored to be here. I was a student at
Speaker 2: Delawares University. I graduated in twenty fourteen, and I'm hearing
Speaker 2: them talk about the class of twenty twenty nine and
Speaker 2: now I'm like, whooh, I'm a grown up. I'm here,
Speaker 2: this is happening I'm just you know, honored to be
Speaker 2: here for many reasons. You know, I heard, you know,
Speaker 2: people before me talk about vision, and that's ironic because
Speaker 2: this morning, when I decided what I was going to
Speaker 2: talk about, vision was one of the things that popped up.
Speaker 1: And coming to.
Speaker 2: Delawaresce A University was that for me, it was the
Speaker 2: sharpening of the vision. It was the tool that I
Speaker 2: needed to really like they say, you know, go out
Speaker 2: and make your mark on the world. And when you
Speaker 2: hear it here, it's just like something you have to
Speaker 2: know the same way you can have to know that
Speaker 2: slide and you know state state Okay, y'all, y'all, y'all,
Speaker 2: kind of seniors state, Oh no, no, no baby, so
Speaker 2: y'all y'all might be the largest class y'all didn't had
Speaker 2: a while, but we were in this room.
Speaker 1: You could hear it, and you could hear the thunder
Speaker 1: of it.
Speaker 2: Because the things that you learn here the state, the
Speaker 2: make your mark on the world, the you know, look
Speaker 2: to the left of you, look to the right of you,
Speaker 2: and really understanding relationship building that has carried me in
Speaker 2: so many of my peers so so so far. You know,
Speaker 2: when I came on the campus. I'm from Women's in Delaware.
Speaker 2: Any Women's in Delaware here? Yeah, okay, so I'm from
Speaker 2: women'son Delaware. When I came on this campus, one of
Speaker 2: the things that I knew was that like, I wanted
Speaker 2: to work in entertainment. I didn't know how. I didn't know,
Speaker 2: you know, what it would be. I just knew what
Speaker 2: I liked and what I didn't like. So I thought.
Speaker 2: But I was able to use this campus, and I
Speaker 2: want to implore you guys, and you know, challenge you
Speaker 2: guys to do the same thing. I was able to
Speaker 2: use this campus to really understand vision and how vision
Speaker 2: should be protected. So you might not know today, you
Speaker 2: might not know what the school year is going to hold.
Speaker 2: You might not know you know what every single day
Speaker 2: will be. Shoot you, I might not even know if
Speaker 2: the major that you guys have chosen at this pointer
Speaker 2: will choose or you know, we'll go in and out
Speaker 2: of is exactly what you want to do, anybody here,
Speaker 2: so figure in life out. Raise your hand. Everybody should
Speaker 2: raise their hand, adults. People look every day. I woke
Speaker 2: up this morning and I said, God, I don't know
Speaker 2: what today has in store for me. I don't know,
Speaker 2: but I'm here and that is my message. As you
Speaker 2: sharpen and protect your vision.
Speaker 1: You may not know.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of things you will not know. There's
Speaker 2: a lot of days you will not be for sure.
Speaker 2: But you are here. You are showing up. And if
Speaker 2: you wake up every day, if you apply yourself to
Speaker 2: something every day, if you are here at Delawares Sate University,
Speaker 2: you are a lot further than the people that are
Speaker 2: not here with you now. In times where you don't know,
Speaker 2: there are certain things that you choose it tend to do.
Speaker 2: You might pick up a phone and call a friend.
Speaker 2: You might look around you. People have talked about mentors.
Speaker 2: I know miss Lorie Hayes is in the building, say him,
Speaker 2: and says Miss Hayes was my mentor. I have my
Speaker 2: uncle Tony here as well. There are people that are
Speaker 2: placed right next to you. I said, look to your
Speaker 2: life and look to your right earlier, let's really do it.
Speaker 2: Look to your left and look to your right. In
Speaker 2: times that you do not know, you will learn as
Speaker 2: you go out into the world how important these people
Speaker 2: that you were building these relationships from day one, day two,
Speaker 2: day twenty, day thirty here at Delaware State University will
Speaker 2: be for your end all be all. I cannot say
Speaker 2: that enough. There are times where I'm doing certain things,
Speaker 2: whether it's at work or in life, and I pick
Speaker 2: up the phone and the people that I call are
Speaker 2: graduates also of Delaware State University. It is so important
Speaker 2: that as you understand what your vision is and you
Speaker 2: try things and you do things and you sharpen that
Speaker 2: you also understand that the person down but that one
Speaker 2: plus one will always equal to because you know, everybody's
Speaker 2: building something. Everybody has a dream, a thought, a goal.
Speaker 2: And when you do not know, you can look to
Speaker 2: the people next to you. You can call on you know,
Speaker 2: other Delaware s A University students that you will begin
Speaker 2: to meet and do things with to help you bring
Speaker 2: that vision to life. There's a lot of times where
Speaker 2: you may not know, but you'll it'll do it anyway,
Speaker 2: and you should.
Speaker 1: I implore you. I challenge you to do it anyway.
Speaker 2: You post that pic on the GRAMD, you're promoting that business,
Speaker 2: only one person likes it, post the second one. You
Speaker 2: put on that outfit because fashion is your thing. It
Speaker 2: don't come out like we thought it would. I've been
Speaker 2: there before, put on another outfit. You're literally in the game,
Speaker 2: and you're in the league, whether you're actually playing a
Speaker 2: sport or you know, I'm hypothetically speaking where if you
Speaker 2: don't shoot the shot, the shot can't go in. And
Speaker 2: you guys are already here like you're already like you're
Speaker 2: not even trying out for the team.
Speaker 1: You're on the You're literally sitting on the side of
Speaker 1: the court.
Speaker 2: You have the team jerseys on, they've already called your name,
Speaker 2: your family's tier, the cheer you on.
Speaker 1: All you have to do up is do is get
Speaker 1: up and go and do it.
Speaker 2: Get up, get in the game, and try so every
Speaker 2: day when you don't know, I challenge you to continue
Speaker 2: to get up, try get in the game.
Speaker 1: Miss the shot. If you don't take the shot.
Speaker 2: You won't You don't even know if you will make
Speaker 2: the shot. Now recently I learned a big lesson in
Speaker 2: you don't know. I've always been a person to just
Speaker 2: kind of, you know, jump out the window and figure
Speaker 2: it out. No way down, but and it happens. Coming
Speaker 2: to Dell State was like that for me. I was
Speaker 2: not supposed to be here. I thought I was going
Speaker 2: to be in New York or California or wherever. I
Speaker 2: honestly only applied to Dell State because of Miss Lory Hayes.
Speaker 1: Back there.
Speaker 2: She was like, well, you know, just in case, apply
Speaker 2: to Delaware State because you're not gonna want to not
Speaker 2: be anywhere again. I want you to at least be
Speaker 2: able to get on the court when everybody else suits up.
Speaker 2: I want you to be at least able to get
Speaker 2: on the court. Throw something at the wall, see if
Speaker 2: it sticks. I applied for Delaware State. They came to
Speaker 2: my high school. They offered me scholarships. I don't even
Speaker 2: think I really understood the gravity of what I was offered.
Speaker 1: I came here on a full academic ride.
Speaker 2: I was able to do so much, and I wasn't
Speaker 2: burdened with like financial issues and you know, some of
Speaker 2: the other issues that I had saw a lot of
Speaker 2: my friends who went to other schools have.
Speaker 1: To deal with.
Speaker 2: Because the Delaware State family really took me in. I've
Speaker 2: made friends in financiate. I did everything that was said
Speaker 2: to me to do. But years later, I'm still walking
Speaker 2: in rooms and figuring things out where I don't know.
Speaker 2: So to back it up, So within this year, I
Speaker 2: decided to jump out another.
Speaker 1: Window again, and I let la.
Speaker 2: I moved back to the East Coast, no job, just
Speaker 2: trying to figure it out. And in my industry, you're
Speaker 2: really out of sight, out of mind. If people don't
Speaker 2: see you every day, if they don't hear you every day,
Speaker 2: it could be the end of the end. And I
Speaker 2: told y'all, I realized while I was sitting here, I'm
Speaker 2: a real grown up now, and real grown ups have
Speaker 2: real bills. So that was very scary for me to
Speaker 2: do that at the time because of so many different reasons,
Speaker 2: including you know, financially, it's just a thing to start over.
Speaker 2: When you get to a certain point, you guys are
Speaker 2: in a very great position because when you don't know
Speaker 2: here at Delawares a University, you'll have your things, and
Speaker 2: you'll have your issues and your things that become your
Speaker 2: daily like, you know, burdens that you're figuring out. But man,
Speaker 2: this is the time where if y'all want to go
Speaker 2: out of you know, I was gonna sigure out of
Speaker 2: a few windows with bybe.
Speaker 1: I shouldn't say that.
Speaker 2: But if y'all want to try things and do things,
Speaker 2: you don't have as much weight on you to figure
Speaker 2: it out. And you learn here how to soar at
Speaker 2: times where you're not even taught to fly, you just
Speaker 2: literally have to figure it out. So when I decided
Speaker 2: to step out of that window again move back over
Speaker 2: to the East Coast, it was what I learned here
Speaker 2: at Delawarestate University about vision and what I wanted for
Speaker 2: myself that made me realize, this is something I can't
Speaker 2: even talk to people about. I just have to do it.
Speaker 2: So in doing that, I did it. I decided to
Speaker 2: start guest hosting. I'm not even decided, but I was
Speaker 2: given an opportunity to start guest hosting at a platform
Speaker 2: called the Breakfast Club. If any guys ever listened to us,
Speaker 2: so I said with CHARLEMAGNEA goud, DJ MV and Ess hilarious.
Speaker 2: But in that whole process, within the last couple of months,
Speaker 2: me and Jess were super viral, and that was a
Speaker 2: space that I had never been in either. And here
Speaker 2: I am again, I don't know, I don't know what's
Speaker 2: about to happen.
Speaker 1: I don't you know. I literally have no idea.
Speaker 2: But all I know is is what my vision was
Speaker 2: for myself, and a lot of that vision again is
Speaker 2: what I sharpened and home didn't here at Delawares State University,
Speaker 2: I knew, you know, what I wanted my end goal
Speaker 2: to be.
Speaker 1: I knew I learned.
Speaker 2: Right here at Delawaress University conflict resolution and you know,
Speaker 2: just perception and branding and starting right here, when people
Speaker 2: came on campus, we knew who was the what. Okay,
Speaker 2: this girl does the interviews, this girl is the dancer,
Speaker 2: this girl's fashion. That guy's a scientist, that guy's the
Speaker 2: number in the accountant. God, you guys don't even realize it,
Speaker 2: but what you're working at every single day, just by
Speaker 2: showing up and getting on the court with your jerseys
Speaker 2: already on, becomes your vision, becomes your brand, and that
Speaker 2: carries you into life and then you have a clear
Speaker 2: pathway of what you want. When you know what you want,
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter what happens. So I'm walking into this
Speaker 2: new room, new people, new conflict, new things that I
Speaker 2: have to figure out. For once in my lifetime, I
Speaker 2: was the story. I wasn't chasing the story. And it's
Speaker 2: a lot of noise. Can y'all start clapping in here
Speaker 2: from your right clasp really really loud? But what you
Speaker 2: guys will know, thise is when you clap, you can't
Speaker 2: really hear me, Okay, you can stop clapping in so,
Speaker 2: how many of you guys were able to hear me
Speaker 2: perfectly as the claps were happening.
Speaker 1: A few of you, right? How many of you guys
Speaker 1: can hear me better? Right now? Let me see some
Speaker 1: hens in their right.
Speaker 2: So life is always good when it's quiet and it's
Speaker 2: calm and there is no noise. But as you go
Speaker 2: throughout your years here at Delaware State University and you
Speaker 2: get out of dull State and you go to leave
Speaker 2: your mark on the world, and that vision has to
Speaker 2: kick in. The biggest thing you have to remember is
Speaker 2: that the noise will come. Those things will happen, but
Speaker 2: you always think back to your foundation, which is what
Speaker 2: you get right here at this HBCU. And when you're
Speaker 2: able to do that, you learn how to mentally when
Speaker 2: all of that is happening, when all the clapping and
Speaker 2: all the noise is happening, You learn how to tunnel
Speaker 2: vision right through it and remember where your vision is
Speaker 2: taking you and why it's important that you arrive there unscathed.
Speaker 1: Outfit heals all of that.
Speaker 2: When I show up, I show up and I make
Speaker 2: it a thing to make sure that I do, because
Speaker 2: that walk trying to talk to y'all over the clapping
Speaker 2: and the noise.
Speaker 1: That is not easy.
Speaker 2: Being here for the four years, the five years, the
Speaker 2: hopefully four the five years, the one year you have
Speaker 2: left wherever you guys are and your school at the point,
Speaker 2: it's not an easy thing.
Speaker 1: It's fun. You learn a lot. It changes your life.
Speaker 2: The experience of life that you learn at Delaware State
Speaker 2: University and traveling to other HBCUs and you know, becoming Greek,
Speaker 2: being in the band. All that stuff is fun and
Speaker 2: it will shape you as a person. But there will
Speaker 2: be hard times. Things will happen. You will have to
Speaker 2: figure out money, life will life. But you'll still have
Speaker 2: your dream, You'll still have the things that you're pushing for.
Speaker 2: And it is so important that when people start clapping
Speaker 2: and the noise starts happening and clapping again, for me,
Speaker 2: it is so important that you learn how to speak
Speaker 2: over that, how to focus over that.
Speaker 1: Y'all get what I'm doing here.
Speaker 2: Y'all have to like the the amount of leverage that
Speaker 2: you guys have. Because you're already on the court, you
Speaker 2: won't understand it while you're here.
Speaker 1: I didn't understand it while I was here, but.
Speaker 2: When I left, I was like, man, I was somewhere
Speaker 2: for four years that allowed me to figure out who
Speaker 2: I was, what I wanted.
Speaker 1: I thought I knew what I wanted.
Speaker 2: But when I came to Dell State the way that
Speaker 2: you know, I was able to polish it, wipe it off,
Speaker 2: hang it up, take it to the dry cleaners, seem it,
Speaker 2: get it really ready for what the world was gonna
Speaker 2: throw at me.
Speaker 1: Because that's another thing too.
Speaker 2: When you get out into this world, you know, especially
Speaker 2: for all of the people in here that look like me,
Speaker 2: you get out into this world, baby, they can't wait
Speaker 2: to humble you or try to. But when you have
Speaker 2: your vision, when you have your foundation, look to the
Speaker 2: left of you again, look to the right of you again.
Speaker 2: When you have the people that you can call on
Speaker 2: and start it right here with you, it's nothing nobody
Speaker 2: can tell you.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: I don't know why I be so emotional, Oh my god.
Speaker 2: My point is, I'm so honored to be here. I
Speaker 2: don't know why I'm so emotional. Maybe it's just like
Speaker 2: a it's all happening for me type of thing, Because
Speaker 2: it's happening for y'all too, but I really, you know,
Speaker 2: just I want these next couple of years for y'all
Speaker 2: to be amazing. And if I haven't said anything, or
Speaker 2: these tears and my makeup that's messing up right now
Speaker 2: hasn't done anything for y'all. I hope that it really
Speaker 2: motivates you guys to get on campus, do listen, go
Speaker 2: to class, have a good time. At the same time,
Speaker 2: learn the balance, enjoy these years. You won't get them back.
Speaker 2: And I know I sound old or however saying that,
Speaker 2: but listen to me when I tell you this right
Speaker 2: here is the best pree game for life you will
Speaker 2: ever experience.
Speaker 1: Do it, and do it well.
Speaker 2: At the end of the day, y'all, there's always a
Speaker 2: lot to talk about, and every single time you guys
Speaker 2: are right here with me to talk about it.
Speaker 1: I'm just elated.
Speaker 2: Okay, we are five million plus downloads in and we're
Speaker 2: doing this thing together. I feel like we are a family,
Speaker 2: my Lowriders. Thank y'all for tuning in every episode. Tell
Speaker 2: a friend to tell a friend that this is where
Speaker 2: their daily download needs to be for all things pop culture.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Laura La Rosa. I'll see you guys
Speaker 2: in my next episode, and I promise I.
Speaker 1: Won't be jiggling baby.
Speaker 2: Go ahead, baby, y'all won't hear the next to sex
Speaker 2: Time by Dad.
Speaker 1: See y'all later