I meant to share this soon after I came on board the site, but I didn't wanna come off like I'm gonna pimp all my Stanford friends on the board, lol. So I just forgot to share it until now. What brought this back to mind was @gijeff mentioning CMac's all-purpose yardage record in the Rose Bowl. I thought to myself, I know another CMac who went to Stanford who is pretty impressive as well! That CMac would be Chris MacAskill, who got a master's degree from Stanford in geophysics. I know Chris from church and our families are pretty close. We've gone to South Africa together and had other fun adventures!
A couple of years ago, in January 2020, he gave a TEDxTalk called "Your difference can be Your Superpower." He talked about his journey from being homeless on the streets of Oakland as a kid with a schizophrenic mother to eventually finding his way into graduate school at Stanford after initially dropping out of college as an undergrad. In the talk, he spoke about how much Stanford means to him and how his experience at Stanford transformed his life. Chris is big into endurance events, that's what got us to South Africa. He and my dad did the Comrades Marathon down there and I came along before my junior year of high school. My dad used to cycle with Chris and one of Chris' favorite cycling routes included going to a certain spot at Stanford where he would stop and kiss the ground. To say the least, Stanford is a very special place to Chris.
I figured some on here would enjoy watching his TedxTalk if they haven't already seen it. It's about 20 minutes in length and he leads with talking about how much he loves Stanford before talking about Stanford later on. So, that's the part that I think most of you will especially like. And then just in general, he has a phenomenal story to share. If this conjures up thoughts about why Stanford means a lot to you personally, by all means feel free to share that in here. That's part of why I wanted to share this as well.
A couple of years ago, in January 2020, he gave a TEDxTalk called "Your difference can be Your Superpower." He talked about his journey from being homeless on the streets of Oakland as a kid with a schizophrenic mother to eventually finding his way into graduate school at Stanford after initially dropping out of college as an undergrad. In the talk, he spoke about how much Stanford means to him and how his experience at Stanford transformed his life. Chris is big into endurance events, that's what got us to South Africa. He and my dad did the Comrades Marathon down there and I came along before my junior year of high school. My dad used to cycle with Chris and one of Chris' favorite cycling routes included going to a certain spot at Stanford where he would stop and kiss the ground. To say the least, Stanford is a very special place to Chris.
I figured some on here would enjoy watching his TedxTalk if they haven't already seen it. It's about 20 minutes in length and he leads with talking about how much he loves Stanford before talking about Stanford later on. So, that's the part that I think most of you will especially like. And then just in general, he has a phenomenal story to share. If this conjures up thoughts about why Stanford means a lot to you personally, by all means feel free to share that in here. That's part of why I wanted to share this as well.
