Justin & Alexis Black - Redefining Normal

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In today’s episode, our guests are Justin Black and Alexis Black. Justin Black founded</span> <em><span style="font-weight: 400;">Rising Over Societal Expectations (ROSE) Empowerment Group</span></em> <span style= "font-weight: 400;">to close the knowledge gap for today’s generation of Black and Brown young adults after his experiences as a Black male in the foster care system. Alexis Black is a foster care graduate. She created The Scholarship Specialist and wrote</span> <em><span style="font-weight: 400;">The Scholarship Roadmap</span></em> <span style="font-weight: 400;">book and workbook and an online tutorial to help students graduate from college debt-free. She is now a foster care volunteer and works as a database reviewer for the</span> <em><span style= "font-weight: 400;">National Youth and Transition Database</span></em><span style="font-weight: 400;">. Today, they will share with us what they have gone through in foster care. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[7:45]</span> <strong>Why should we listen to you?</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">They should listen to us because everybody has a perspective of the ordinary. And everybody’s normal is entirely different.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[9:35]</span> <strong>What were your experiences like growing in foster care?</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">How we laid out the book was we each wrote our alternating perspectives because even though we are together, we are very much individual people with dreams, goals, and pains. I grew up in an emotionally abusive and toxic environment until I met Justin. That’s how our story intertwines together the past that we once experienced when we met in college.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[21:00]</span> <strong>What was the vision for the book?</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">We originally started the book as more of a selfish project of getting closer together before getting married becaus