Believing in Himself
Djdade Denson sounds like he has nine lives: Marquette University Engineering graduate, researcher, entrepreneur, teacher, Black, male, athlete, activist, native Milwaukeean. Asked how he moves fluidly between these identities, from Djdade-researching-proactive-pathogens-in-water to Djdade-the-Marquette-engineering-student to Djdade-from-the-53206-neighborhood, he laughs, “I know how to code-switch.” That’s right, Denson (DJ to his peers) is from the 53206 ZIP code, just north of Marquette’s campus, which was recently the subject of the documentary, “Milwaukee 53206” highlighting the area with the highest incarceration rate of young Black men per capita in the world. For DJ, that is home.
DJ knows his path has been paved with opportunity. His mother worked at Milwaukee College Prep, an inner-city network of K-8 schools focused on narrowing the achievement gap, so that is where he attended grammar school. From there, he earned a scholarship to an elite private suburban high school. He was a top athlete, and caught the notice of Marquette Track & Field coaches who offered him some scholarship aid. More than that, he had two active parents in his life, and the influence of older cousins and a sister who attended college. But those are not his only experiences. His aunt taught him lessons he still uses today: how to carry himself, to walk with purpose, to close the blinds, to get low when he hears gunshots. Not until he was in high school did he meet people who went to bed not worried. “Not worried!”, he exclaims, “can’t even imagine that.”
At Marquette, he majored in Environmental Engineering, but he was called back to the inner city over and over. Through the Center for Urban Teaching, he landed an opportunity teaching summer school to third- and fourth-graders back at Milwaukee College Prep. “We had four weeks of bootcamp, like orientation, then we were in the classroom teaching Math and ELA and Religion.” Right away, he was handling complex issues, like did a student eat breakfast, or sleep safely the night before, or what is going on outside the classroom that was making learning difficult? “Research says that age is crucial in development and future success, where kids build confidence in their abilities,” says Denson. But if a kid was labeled as a bad student, or trouble, it was tricky to shake off that characterization. Denson found many of those kids sought him out, and he connected with them one-on-one, working on explaining concepts in a non-traditional way. He recognized being a black male role model was a critical part of his identity. He started to talking to the kids about careers other than sports or basketball, about sharing ideas and being creative thinkers. He listened, and listened, and listened some more. Kids gained confidence in sharing their ideas or goals, and DJ realized this is the American Dream — having an idea and the conviction it could happen — but that’s not advocated to inner city kids. He started talking about entrepreneurship: you can work for yourself, believe you can do this, and even if you strike out, you won’t strike all the way out, because you are educated. ‘We need a mentoring program for these kids’ was his recurring thought.
Formed by growing up in the central city, he was particularly troubled studying the lead-tainted water issues in the poorest neighborhoods in Flint, Michigan. It hit very close to home: a marginalized population losing access to yet another resource, when in fact we are all literally connected by a system of pipes underground — how could one community be so disadvantaged? Denson sought research opportunities with Global Water Lab through the College of Engineering. He has studied pathogens that attack immune systems, and worked on safe chemical disposal practices, learned to write grants and seek research funding. With the largest freshwater source (“other than glaciers”) truly just down the street, he believes in a research hub located here, inclusion of community outreach, and initiatives to keep the Great Lakes clean and useful for everyone. “Research can find issues in Milwaukee that are applicable elsewhere; we have dialogue about lead, keeping Flint in mind, and a commitment to future generations,” he says. “Plus, we are all connected, the Great Lakes are connected, and we need to share information on invasive species and algae blooms, that appear in one area but could impact us all.”
Denson is always thinking of a bigger picture, and recognizes things are not always what they seem on the surface. True of water, true of a troubled kid in a classroom, true of his own 53206 neighborhood. He speaks openly about the documentary shining a light on his section of the city, and the importance of balancing the negatives with the positives. “Communities are more than just their statistics”, he says. “There are a lot of good things happening, but could be more with more resources.” A big issue is money circulation — it doesn’t stay in the community. “We need local shops, gas stations, to keep money revolving, and to support hiring local people. Where we are spending money is not in our own community, it’s like money is being vacuumed out rather than reinvesting. No one can prosper without resources.” One local restaurant making a go of it is Coffee Makes You Black, on Teutonia Avenue in the heart of 53206. Denson knows the owner, a family friend, and decided to do his part to boost business. A member of the Marquette University Men’s Track & Field team (with medals in the long jump and triple jump from Big East Conference competition), Denson proposed they have a team-meal at Coffee Makes You Black. “I wanted them to see the vibrant community where I grew up,” he explains. “It has African-American leaders there who are knowledgeable people spreading good stories about the history of this city, cool setting, good music. Plus, the brunch is phenomenal.”
Coffee Makes You Black served as another influential learning foundation for him. “I had never seen someone build something. No one around me owned anything.” He was curious about loans and mortgages, and also about investing in a risky neighborhood. “There is a trust issue. We don’t have it. We might want to meet and talk about the problems on the block, but we don’t go in each others’ homes; I don’t want you seeing my stuff, I don’t know you…”, and a community space helps solve that. “We need places to gather, to meet, to share food and ideas. We have none of that.” He recognized the neighbors were often just like his mother: living in a house first bought generations ago when grandparents migrated north for work, and now the building does not hold it’s value, and even if sold, would not afford the seller to buy something similar elsewhere. “We are used, trapped.” There’s nothing here, he says, no corner stores where a teen can get a job, no grocery store, no options. There are also no role models, which layers on the problems. “Growing up in the inner city, you didn’t see any role models; you maybe noticed a guy strung out on drugs, and thought ‘I don’t want to be like him’, but you don’t know what else there is.” The only people with money seem to be dealing drugs, and if they are caught, their family loses income and slides toward more bad choices. He sees how it is. And the one thing he does begin to know is that his voice matters. His neighbors do not want an outsider to come to them with criticism or grandiose plans; he is one of them and can talk openly without sounding critical or judgmental. “My mom used to tell me I mumbled, and now she tells me, ‘People are listening to you!’.”
Breaking the cycle is hard. “I don’t know where I’d be without school and sports,” he says. He remembers sitting in his private high school as a new freshman, surrounded by students who never worried about money or food or safety or drug dealers or gunshots. He had a big hand-me-down laptop in his backpack (“it was a real clunker”), given to him proudly as a gift, for use at his new school, but he never took it out in the classroom, as everyone else had a MacBook. He once invited some new friends to his house for a birthday celebration; they opted not to come when they heard the address. He realized he could fit in, and he would control what he’d lose; he’d just sacrifice part of his story or repress some of his identity to be successful. Sports was the answer, and he excelled. When it came time to apply to college, he was daunted by application fees, and felt guilty asking his parents for money, which would be completely wasted if he failed to be admitted. Someone mentioned a fee waiver, and he began to recognize how not even knowing what questions to ask was an enormous barrier.
Now he’s networking, working on building and sustaining a project of his own: mentoring young inner-city students. He is a project manager at Hunzinger Construction, recently earning their elite LEED status for specializing in renewable/reusable resources; he opted to stay local after graduation, and continue to move between work and the old neighborhood. “Plus, Milwaukee is happening— it’s vibrant, it’s growing, Milwaukee’s up next” — and he wants those opportunities extended to every corner. He is working to create the mentor program he envisioned, focusing on inner-city middle-school and high-school students, to help them navigate investing, entrepreneurship, learn about taxes and building credit, “the nuts and bolts of life that maybe they don’t receive at home because maybe their parents just don’t know or were never taught it.” But more than that, to give them access to role models. As he says “you become what you see”, so Denson wants to “encourage young people to think differently early on, gain positive direction rather than believe everything is against you. What I really want them to know is where you come from does not dictate where you can go; it forms you but does not define you. I think I can help with that.”
If you are looking for DJ, you may find him exactly where he came from, helping Coffee Makes You Black with community outreach, or in the halls of MCP grade school, or speaking at fundraisers, or visiting back at Marquette’s Engineering Hall or the Marquette Gym. He’s networking, and launching his mentor program with the next school year. It may seem Djdade Denson has nine lives, that’s true. But the reality is, like all of us, he has one life — this one — and he’s doing everything he can to live it making a difference in the place that made him.
(note: if you are interested in connecting with Djdade about the mentor program, the best way to reach him is through his LinkedIn profile.)
