Black Excellence: Jewel Younge

Tariq El-Amin  00:01
Welcome to “Black Excellence” at UIC Office of Diversity, Equity and Engagement with Dr. Aisha El-Amin.

Recording of Dr. Martin Luther King  00:09
[Applause] Believe in yourself and believe that you’re somebody.

Clips from 1995 movie “Panther”  00:17
That we study and master a bunch of different things.
Why are you here? 
Study and master a bunch of different things.
I’m proud to introduce our new Minister of Information

Aisha El-Amin  00:26
I’m Dr. Aisha El-Amin.

Tariq El-Amin  00:29
Welcome to “Black Excellence.”

Aisha El-Amin 0:32

Hello! Hello! Peace and blessings good people! Welcome to the University of Illinois Chicago “Black Excellence” podcast sponsored by the Office of Student Success and Belonging in partnership with the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Strategic Marketing and Communications. I am your host, Dr. Aisha El-Amin, and I serve as UIC’s executive associate vice provost for student success and belonging. UIC’s “Black Excellence” podcast initiated in Black history in 2022. So, we started off with “28 Days of Black Excellence,” to highlight the history and legacy of exceptional Black faculty, students and staff that call UIC home. During this month, we talked to graduates in all walks of life, from entrepreneurs to politicians, and they offered inspiration and sage advice while connecting the historic past to our contemporary times. However, UIC’s cup of Black excellence runneth over. And so, we continue this podcast with the understanding that you cannot know where you’re going until you understand, appreciate and connect into where you have come from. 

So, I’m extremely excited and honored to have a conversation today with Dr. Jewel Sophia Younge, and she’s a clinical assistant professor and clinical pharmacist at UIC’s College of Pharmacy. And Dr. Younge is also an alumni of UIC’s College of Pharmacy, class of 2017. In her clinical role, she provides direct patient care at CommunityHealth, the nation’s largest volunteer-run free clinic in English and Spanish for people with hypertension and diabetes, and those that wish to quit smoking. At UIC’s College of Pharmacy, she also teaches. She teaches about diabetes and weight loss. In addition, she is a well published author. She has both publications in the field of pharmacy, but also has founded and published three literary magazines, a blog and a graphic novel. Yeah, she has been busy. Her original poems and essays appear in magazines, journals and anthologies, and best-known as the prize-winning “Encyclopedia of identity.” And these subjects ranged from old-school hip-hop, to pygmy languages, and her plays have appeared on Chicago stages, both on and off Broadway. So, not only is she an author, a pharmacist, a graduate, a professor, playwright, like all of those things. So, she is just extremely inspiring, and she is here with us today, even though she has a fracture. And just to make sure that she offers us some sage advice.

 And so, I really want to just first of all start by thanking her for taking out time today. I know things are quite busy. She’s on her way into an appointment now but made time to be on our podcast today. So welcome, Dr. Jewel, thank you so much for joining us.

Jewel Younge 3:44

Thank you. It’s an honor and a privilege to be here. I’m humbled to be asked.

Aisha El-Amin 3:49

Absolutely. Can you just tell us a little bit about yourself? Like where are you originally from? What made you go into, you know, the College of Pharmacy? And how did you both do pharmacy and all these other things that you’re doing as well, I would love to know.

Jewel Younge 4:07

So, I’m actually from St. Louis, and I came to Chicago in 1999. I went to the University of Chicago and at that time, it was my aspiration to be a playwright. So, most of the arts and humanities work I did was before 2013, when I was a teacher, I was a schoolteacher. I also taught at Olive-Harvey College, most of the City Colleges. I taught at DePaul University, and I taught English, humanities, theater, world languages and cultures. So, that was my domain for a very long time, and I became really inspired by my students at City Colleges of Chicago. I would see them come in at all ages having all sorts of backgrounds, and within two to four years, they would leave on a different trajectory, and they would be an inspiration to their family and their friends and they were an inspiration to me. So, I just decided. I tell people every day they can change their life, so I can change my life too. And I looked around at City Colleges to see what the offerings were that suited me and my colleagues at City Colleges really embraced my vision and my dream. They encouraged me, they supported me, and I did my prerequisites at Olive-Harvey College with my students, and then I applied to UIC College of Pharmacy and I was surprised and honored that I was accepted.

Aisha El-Amin 5:47

Wow, wow. Like I’m blown away by that. I really am. So now, do you use all of… how do you meld those two worlds together? Right. So, you have all of this acting and writing and now pharmacy? Is there a way that these kind of coincide?

Jewel Younge 6:08

Yes, that’s a great question. Students often ask me, what makes you a good pharmacist? I tell them it’s everything about who I was before I came to the College of Pharmacy. So, some of the things that being in the humanities taught me was how to be very, very understanding of people and their problems and their objections and their secrets. Secrets that we need to know, secrets they have a right to keep, and how to interact with people and engage them in a way that will help them tell me what’s wrong because I really can’t help somebody if they won’t tell me what’s wrong. But I know from my own experiences with the health care system, sometimes you don’t trust the practitioner, and you want to keep that information guarded. You want help, but you won’t want to say why you want help. 

So, that’s one of the things that I do. So, I lean in, when I listen, I listen with my whole body, I try to use my voice to reflect that I appreciate what people are saying. I try to keep a poker face when I can or show how much I care when I need to. And I really believe in self-actualization. So, I think about health care that way. If it’s, if it’s geared towards bringing you closer to your goals, then it’s a decision that we should move towards together. And if it’s not, then we need to figure out a different strategy, even if it means that you don’t do anything I say. That’s OK. That’s OK. Because you’re not here for me, I’m here for you.

Aisha El-Amin 7:47

Wow! Tell me. So, you teach classes around hypertension, diabetes. Why did you select that area of specialty to you know, to dive into?

Jewel Younge 7:59

That area really selected me. So, I work in Black and brown communities, probably because I live in those communities, and I like to work where I live. I like a short commute. So, I want to work right with my neighbors, and those are the conditions that are really highly affecting people in my community, so that’s just where I’ve gotten the most practice and I’ve become the most astute.

Aisha El-Amin 8:29

Wow! Wow! Well, you know that that’s needed, right. I mean, that’s…I… Yeah, because when I look at my family, I completely understand that and appreciate that you’re doing that work in the community. When you look back at your time, as a student at UIC, what are some of the memories that you have?

Jewel Younge 8:51

I was extremely fortunate because I came in as an older student. So, I was probably 10 years older than most people in my class, and I was really embraced by the other students; particularly the Black students in our class were just extremely close and we had really a no person left behind mentality. So, if somebody wasn’t in class, we were on the phone, we were texting, we were calling. If somebody looked confused we were asking, “Did you get that? I don’t know if you got that I didn’t get it, I don’t know if you got it,” and I can’t tell you how many times I was sitting in the wrong classroom, waiting for somebody to show up, and Eldrid Bell or Reenee or Amber would come to my rescue and say, “Jewel, we’re all in 134-1 and class is starting in five minutes.” So those are my best memories. I had no idea how much I would need them, and I would not be a pharmacist if it were not for them. I can tell you that, for sure.

Aisha El-Amin 10:05

Wow, the village getting the village. That’s so important. So, with every journey, there’s some challenges, right? And so can you talk a little bit about your challenges and how, I mean, obviously, you overcame those things, in hopes that if someone is listening to this and their experiencing some challenges that they know that they can also land on the other side of those challenges.

Jewel Younge 10:30

My biggest challenge was that I really had no background in science before I started those prerequisites at Olive-Harvey College, and City Colleges prepared me very well for UIC College of Pharmacy. But I still had to do a lot of catching up and a lot of self-study, and I had to break down the way I study in a very, very new and different way. So, instead of the humanities, where primarily you read things and you watch things and that’s how you learn, I had to start drawing things, illustrating things, coloring things. I had to discover a new brain pathway, and I try to encourage people, don’t be afraid to go back to the basics. You hit a wall with these studies and the help that you need may not be there just because you can’t express what you need. 

So, it really can be incumbent on you to go back to the basics like, “How can I internalize this?” “When I look at this material how can I grasp it and bring it into my mind and integrate it into my circuitry?” And be humble about it. Don’t be afraid to get your crayons out. Because if I didn’t get my crayons out, I wouldn’t be a pharmacist, and I enjoy being a pharmacist and I’m glad I did it. So, I still have illustrations in my office that I drew my first year of pharmacy school and when the students come in the room, I point it out to you — this is what I had to do to get here so don’t be ashamed to go to tutoring. I had to start coloring.

Aisha El-Amin 12:10

Oh, I love that. So, if you could give words of advice to students that are at City Colleges, students that are maybe at another community college that, you know, could help them. What would that that advice be from you?

Jewel Younge 12:32

I would tell them that you are where you are supposed to be. So many times, people will say to me, “Oh, I should have done this 20 years ago.” But I don’t know if that’s true. Because 20 years ago, you didn’t do it, and there was a reason that you didn’t do it and maybe everybody else in the world made you feel like that reason was small, but we make decisions based on our needs, our wants, our resources, our fears, our priorities, and I think most people try to make the best decision they can, given what they have.

So if you didn’t do it 20 years ago, it was because you were supposed to do it now. So you are where you are supposed to be right now. And just embrace that and, and live in that truth and, again, look to your resources. What you need is around you, and just open your mouth, ask for help. It’s there for you, and you deserve it. And you deserve to have what you want. You have what you dream, and we need you to get those things.

Aisha El-Amin 13:39

I appreciate that advice, and it resonates with me, because we do oftentimes have something that we tell ourselves until we believe it, and sometimes we have to reprogram that. And so for those that are out there listening, know that you got this and you have faculty like Dr. Jewel that are here at UIC, that have been on this journey and path. And I want to say if they come here, they can reach out to you because you know, I know that that will be inspiring for many.

Jewel Younge 14:18

And it’s inspiring for me. So please, I can’t speak for other Black and brown faculty, but for me, sometimes I get lonely and when the students come to my office, it really lifts my spirits. It brings me a lot of joy, and they helped me and they teach me so much more than I think I teach them. They keep me young they keep me into technology they keep me desiring to know new music and to see new movies and so it’s, I don’t know if they know how much the faculty need them as well.

Aisha El-Amin 15:00

Wow, I love that. Now I have to ask you this question, too, because I know that old-school hip-hop is a thing for you, and you just talked about the folks keeping you up on the music. So, what musician or song or even you know, I know you do poems as well. Where do you get your inspiration from in the arts?

Jewel Younge 15:33

Wow, what an amazing question. So, there’s a song by Goapele. I think we probably all know this song, although I’m blanking on the name, and H.E.R did like a remix of the song and — “Closer to My Dreams.” I think I listened to that song five times a day, every day of pharmacy school. That song was so important to me. So, “Too Far to Turn Back Now,” Mary Mary, that was another one that I listened to over and over again. And there’s even a movie called “Rabbit-Proof Fence,” and it’s about a young, native Australian girl who had been kidnapped from her family along with her sisters, several times, and put in a boarding school and she ran away every time, and she would cross the Outback, and there’s a scene where she’s in the middle of the Outback, and you look forward, it’s just desert and she looks behind her and it’s just desert and you can see her say to herself, well, you have gone too far to turn back so you have only one option, which is to keep moving forward. So, I thought about that movie and that scene a lot. 

In general, I feel like when I was in humanities, I did a lot of talking about the importance of assessing your future, if that makes sense, assessing your future. Figuring out who you are in your future and visualizing that and becoming that and that as the steps to self-actualization and so that idea that within you is a vision for your future. As a human concept, you know, for all of us, it’s something that I really believe deeply in. So, when I thought about changing my career, I thought to myself, I have stopped, I have ceased to have a future here, and now when I visualize my future, it’s in a different place, and I have to go to that place. I must move to that place, or I’m not going to be fully here in any place. So, those concepts mean a lot to me, and I taught world religions for a while so I try to bring together the great wisdom of all of the faith systems that I taught, just in order to continually remind myself that inspiration is universal and real and it pushes people towards amazing things that change the world, and try to access that energy when I feel like it’s beyond me.

Aisha El-Amin 18:30

I can think of two people in particular that I love dearly that will get so much out of the words that you’ve just shared. So, I’m going to, you know, we have to edit this, and it’ll be you know, it’d be a few weeks, but I want them to hear it now because I do believe that, that self-actualization and manifesting that and seeing yourself and just that vision. Now I have to, I have to…”Rabbit From the Fence” you say was the movie?

Jewel Younge 18:59

“Rabbit-Proof Fence”

Aisha El-Amin 19:02

“Rabbit-Proof Fence.” OK, yeah. Now, I have to see that because just a visualization of that. I have to keep going forward.

Jewel Younge 19:11

Yes!

Aisha El-Amin 19:12

That’s huge. That’s huge. This has been an absolute joy and delight to meet you. I hope that we can connect, you know, beyond the podcast and if I can ever be of any assistance to you in any way, please feel free to reach out. Absolutely.

Jewel Younge 19:32

Thank you. Thank you. And you are so beautiful. I have to tell you that you are so beautiful. You are beautiful in your appearance and your dress, your voice, your personality that you convey. You are just a wonderful, beautiful person and I’m honored to have met you as well. It’s really nice. I couldn’t have predicted from your email, like how fantastic you would be.

Aisha El-Amin 19:58

Oh, you gotta stop telling the truth. No, I’m just kidding. (LAUGHTER)

Aisha El-Amin 20:07

You know, I think we only see beauty when we have beauty, so I’m a reflection of your beauty and so thank you. I receive that, and I certainly appreciate it. And I took that from my mother-in-law. She always says that when I compliment her, so I just had to use it.

Aisha El-Amin 20:37

Well, you keep doing the work that you’re doing and keep being the inspiration that you are. Now I’ve got a movie to watch, I got a couple of songs, and I’m gonna kick on as well. So, I’m hoping our viewers also do the same because we got a lot of great places to go, and we are also appreciating where we are because, as you said, we’re doing what we’re supposed to be and where we’re supposed to be now. And so, all of those words truly do resonate with me. And I want to thank you for being part of our podcast. I hope that they take that brace off today so that you know you can dance to the songs with your arms and your wrist.

Aisha El-Amin 21:26

All right, well, you have a beautiful day.

Jewel Younge 21:29

You too, you too, stay cool.

Tariq El-Amin 21:38

[Music] Thanks for joining us find more inspiring and informative conversations with UIC alumni, faculty and staff at blackresources.uic.edu. That’s blackresources.uic.edu.