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Joe C. Rice is President and Chief Executive Officer of Mid-Pacific Institute (MPI), an independent, grades kindergarten through twelve (pre-kindergarten effective 2005-2006 school year, 141-year college-preparatory school which is located adjacent to the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Mr. Rice has been with Mid-Pacific Institute since 1996, and oversees all corporate financial, development, and educational activities. He is a member of its Board of Trustees.
Evan: Welcome to Greater Good Radio Hawaii, where we develop tomorrow’s leaders by bringing you up close and personal with today’s top business people. Greater Good Radio Hawaii is dedicated to social entrepreneurship. I’m your host, Evan Leong and with me is my co-host, Kari Leong.
Kari: Thank you, Evan. Today’s guest is Joe Rice, President and CEO of Mid-Pacific Institute, a college preparatory school. He has received the Golden Apple Award for Education Excellence, Excellence in Education Administration Award, and the National Golden Acorn Award in the 1990s. Please welcome to Greater Good Radio, Joe Rice. Welcome to our show, Joe.
Joe: Hi.
K: So how did you get into the education field? You’ve been there for about 35 years, right?
J: 35 years now. Seems like a long time. Should retire. I just fell into it really. I was going to be a social worker and came down to my senior year and I was applying to the School of Social Work and found out that my foreign language wasn’t good enough to get in and all of a sudden I started thinking about what could I do? The counselors asked me about why did I want to go into social work and I said I want to give back. I have to do something to kind of give back for all the people that helped me in life and social work was a good avenue. And they said, well, there’s a whole bunch of other things you could consider and one of them was education which was my first thought. Senior year of college… education.
E: So if we could go a little but farther back from that, can we talk a little bit about maybe some of the background things that made you want to go into social work or education? Why would you want to go into something like that?
J: Well, looking back on life, I think a lot of people would say my life growing up was a little different than many children. I’m the oldest of twelve. My family basically worked crops from the time I was about three years old until I started my sophomore year in high school and we basically went from the lower part of California up to Canada doing field crops, living in tents, just going from job to job to job for many years. I think probably out of all those years, about two of them that we actually had a house that we rented and lived in and then something would happen and we would have to move often in the dead of night and so because of our lifestyle
E: Did you just pick up your household and leave?
J: Well we had a Ford station wagon and we basically put our belongings on the lower floor, took out the seats in the back, loaded it up with our stuff, blankets on the top and then the kids would just kind of lie on the top and we’d just go from season to season, farm to farm, working crops. My stepfather wasn’t always the best of fathers, drank a lot. Later in my life my mom also drank a lot. There was a lot of poverty and sorrow in your life it leads a lot of people to do things that maybe other families wouldn’t do, so we ended up with a lot of abuse in our family, a lot of times going hungry, no jobs, looking for a place to stay or food to eat, and it seemed that there was always groups that would step forward to help us when things were the most desolate. Salvation Army helped us a lot, the first church I ever went to partly because I felt good about their mission, Social Services, welfare, all of those folks helped us a lot after really rough times. I think I was in foster care about four times including my brothers and sisters. We’d be taken away and be put in different homes and things, but cared for, and then returned back to our home which was a car and we’d get up and go again. A couple of times we were collected from our foster families by our dad and mom, you know, called outside. I’m not sure how they found out where we were and we’d pack up in a car and off we’d go. But we had plenty of help from lots of people and it just stuck in my mind that if I ever had an opportunity, I was going to give back.
E: Can you share a story of maybe somebody that had helped you and maybe it was a turning point for you?
J: You know there’s so many as I look back on it. And this is growing up through high school. There’s so many things that happen. It’s hard to pick just one. I know there was a time when because I worked in the fields, I actually went to school in a camp tent that was set up by the Department of Education in the farm, and you would go there and meet people. I remember that when I was very young, too young to start school, they would still let me go in there and sit with the younger group, and so actually I learned to read and do some of the academic things earlier than a lot of kids did, but the teacher would let me because she knew that back at my little cabin or whatever we were staying at, sometimes a tent, a good chance the parents weren’t there and I was just alone so I was a three or four-year-old so they just let me sit in on the classes. That was meaningful to me. I remember in high school taking French as my foreign language and starting later than most people do since I hardly ever went to school, that my French wasn’t that good. I practiced the dialogue in my head but nobody else to speak with. I’d go to class and everyone would get up and do their (French speaking) speeches and I couldn’t do it. The teacher actually was from Spain but she spoke fluent Spanish, Japanese, excuse me, Spanish and French, and was from the area between Spain and France and knew about being kind of torn between cultures and a poor life and stuff so she had a lot of sympathy and empathy for me, so she never asked me to get up and give my dialogues. She would always say, “That’s okay, Joe. I know that you didn’t have time to practice and things.” And I got a decent grade, like a C, even though you love them, how can you give them an A or B when they can’t do the dialogue? But what happened was later in college, I took a couple more years of French and I again worked every year of college, full-time job, and went to school. So I very seldom did all of the work and assignments, but I had a very good memory and so I’d do okay on the tests, but when it came time to take the French exams, I couldn’t do it. And partly because of the leniency, if you want to call it, or compassion that people showed me on the way, not allowing me to get up and embarrass myself in front of others. But because of that decision, I couldn’t get into school social work, but because of that decision, I was directed toward consideration of education and it became the love and passion of my life. So all because of somebody’s compassion and help for me, which could be looked at negatively or positively, I made a decision. And I have plenty of those. I have folks in my life that have come forward and taken me away when my father was after me for beatings and things and they’d hide me. How do you ever pay them back when they were risking themselves against my dad because they’d be friends of his, all kinds of examples of that, but anyone I would say it’s’ been a lifetime of people stepping forward for me and my brothers and sisters.
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Writer Profile
Jay-R Patron
Jay-R Patron, 24 years old, currently works as content provider for a multinational IT consultancy firm, under its interactive marketing department.
He was a writer for Hawaii-based Greater Good Inc., a media company behind the much-acclaimed Greater Good Radio. The show promotes social entrepreneurship and servant leadership.
Jay-r is a Journalism and Communication and Media Studies graduate from the University of Southern Queensland.
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Comments
meddahi | Sep 8th, 2007
بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم والصلاة والسلام على أشرف المرسلين وعلى آله وأصحابه أجمعين أما بعد .. ببعد التحية والسلام على أهل المحبة والإكرام
لقد أضفت إلى القصيدة 16بيت من الشعر أرجو أن تنال إعجابكم وبجانبي
صديقي الحميم
وهو طالب نجيب ذو قريحة قوية تعتمد على الحفظ والإستذكار
أتمنى له كل التوفيق ولكل الدارسين والدارسات آمبن
والله ولي التوفيق
الشاعر العصامي مداحي العيد هذه القصيدة من بحر الطويل 28/08/2007
قد انحــدر الدمــع من الأحـــداق ..... فـما أصـعـب الوجــد بعـد الفـراق...
لقد أرقــتـني بهـــواها في ليال قد....... عــوى الذئــبُ فيها من الإشتياق ...
فـما أعــــذب الحــبَّ إذا كان وافيا ....... تُـتـــمّهُ مكــــــــــارم الخـــلاق....
فذبت كما الشمع يذوب على ثوب......... العشيق ولـم يـدر من الإرهاق....
ولولا المحـــــبة التي ليَّـنت قلبا ........... فصارت عواطفه مثل البراق....
لكان الفؤاد كصوان الجـمادات .......... على النار يرمـــونه للإحتراق....
فأصبح من هوى الحبيبة عاطلا ......... كطــير أصـيبَ في جناح الأفاق....
فزالت عزائم الحــياة من القلب .......... تفـتَّتَ جــسم الفـتى كـالأوراق....
وما أهون الحبََّ الذي كان مبنيا ......... على النــــفع هيـّنٌ كمثل النفاق....
وما الحبُّ إلا نخلةٌ سمقت تُعطي......... لكُلّ مــن الأجــــــيال تمر المذاق.
وحر الهوى أذاب قطب المشاعر ........ كنـهـر جرت مياهه في السواقي
نمت به أشجار تــــدلت ثمارها ......... من الغصـن تـُقطـف من الإلتصاق ...
فكــيف سنشـعــر بقيمتـنا إن لم ......... نُـفـعــّلْ مــحـــــــبةً نأت بالطلاق ...
وهل ينفع العــناق إن كان قلبكَ ......... بعـــيدٌ كبعــد المشـــرقين واقي ...
إذا كان حبهم من القــلب يمكث .......... إذا بقيت أرواحــهم في الرماق ...
ونحن نحبذ المحـــبة إن كانت ........... مصـــادرها منــــابع الأشـواق...
إذا ما صفا القـــاعُ رأيتَ لآلئا ........... بريـقٌ صفــاؤها مع الماء راقي ....
لقد حيّرت بحسنها أعيُنا راغت......... إليــها بـــــــــلا رويــة كالبُــراق...
ولولا الغرام ما عرفتُ المحبة ........ التي شغــلت قــلـبا يريد التـلاقي...
فتى ً قد أصيبَ قلبُهُ من كدر الهوى...... هُمومٌ تراكمت على الأعناق...
لقد أرّقــــته أحـــــــــلامٌ تركّـبت........ من العشق إستحسانُه كالمذاق...
أتت تشتكي من شغف الحبّ قد أذى ..... مشاعرها من لوعةِ الإشتياق..
فقلتُ لها إصبري على العشق صبرا قد.....تنالين منه عـــزّةَ الأخلاق...
بكت من حرارة الجوى أدمُعا كوت ...... فؤادي ووجداني من الأعماق...
وقالت فكــيف يصبرُ القلبُ قبل أن ....... يرى القلبَ راض أمام الرفاق..
تحسرتُ باكــــيا علـيها وكـيف لا ...... تســيل دُمـــوعُنا مـن الأحداق
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