Wendy Reed Randall

A degree can launch your career or help you take it to the next level, but sometimes, going to college changes your life in even deeper ways.

Growing up in a New Orleans housing project, Wendy Reed Randall was surrounded by intense poverty and dangerous circumstances. She rose above it, eventually obtaining a master’s degree from the National College of Education. Wendy’s degree prepared her for a successful career as a teacher and substance abuser counselor, but it was an essay she wrote as a student that changed her life the most.

Thanks in part to her supportive NLU community, what began as a paper on the hardships she faced growing up became Once There Was a Girl: A Memoir, published in 2020. Now, Wendy is self-employed as an author and uses her story to inspire others going through hard times—all of whom deserve the opportunity to discover what they could become.