From Life's Bottom to the Top of Her Class

By Michele NKCollison

PHILADELPHIA Sheila Secret was telling the dramatic story of her life to
a class of young women in West Philadelphia University City High School,
when one of her listeners became agitated.

"I can't believe you said your parents don't influence your life," the
teenager, Delores Maalikulmulk, soon blurted out. Ms. Maalikulmulk and the
others in the classroom were enrolled in the Opportunity Program, a service
for students with academic problems.

"No," Ms. Secret replied. "I said your family and your economic status
don't dictate what your life is going to be."

Ms. Secret had traveled a long way to give her talk that morning: Three
years ago, she was a drug dealer or, as she told the young women, "a piper."

Today, she is at the top of her class at the Community College of
Philadelphia, where she has earned two associate degrees, one in general
studies and one in mental health studies. She is the first black woman to
head the state chapter of Phi Theta Kappa, the honor society for twoyear
colleges. Next fall, she hopes to attend Bryn Mawr College, where her goal
is a bachelor's degree in social work.

This school year, she is spreading the gospel of clean living to young
people in Pennsylvania. And she has helped start a group called
ExOffenders Inc. to dispatch others to do the same.

In her appearances, she does not try to sugarcoat her life. Her language
is often graphic and raw as she tries to prevent young people from
traveling a similar road.

"The person you see before you today is not the person I was three years
ago," she told the young women. "I was incarcerated three times. I was a
drug dealer and I hoped I could convince you to help sell for me because
you are young. And I could buy you off with a pair of sneakers."

She told stories of taking food stamps as payment for drugs: "Sometimes I
had mothers on welfare who would tell me, 'Secret, I'm done with this. I've
got to straighten myself out this month because the kids need to eat.' And
I would tell them that I would give them a hit on the house, knowing as
soon as they got the hit, I was taking all those food stamps."

But she also offered words of wisdom.

"People will say you're not going to amount to anything," she told her
listeners. "People will say your teachers are wasting time giving you extra
time and attention. Don't let them label you. Each one of you is important
enough for me to come and take the time to talk to you."

She added: "Education brings you out of darkness, out of ignorance. I never
sit in the back of class. I'm greedy, I want every piece of knowledge. I
make the teachers do their jobs and I do mine."

Most of the 40 young students listened, some nudging each other when Ms.
Secret made a compelling point. A few, however, used the hour to take a nap.

When her talk was over, Ms. Secret and Ms. Maalikulmulk, 16, huddled in a
corner.

With tears streaming down her face, the teenager told Ms. Secret that her
mother is a drug abuser who left her family twice to go to prison, and that
her mother had been drugfree for five years before her second incarceration.

"Why go back after five years?" Ms. Maalikulmulk said. "She didn't have to
go back. She had a family who loves her." At 16, Ms. Maalikulmulk lives
with her infant and 2yearold toddler. She works and goes to school while
her grandmother takes care of her children.

"When I walk across the stage at graduation with all those other parents in
the audience," she asked, "who's going to be there for me?"

Ms. Secret hugged Ms. Maalikulmulk, handed her a card and told her to call
at any time. She also advised the young woman to separate her mother's
addiction from her own feelings of abandonment.

"Delores is mad at me because she thinks I'm just like her mother," Ms.
Secret said later. "And she's afraid, because she thinks she'll end up like
her mother."

The story conjured haunting memories for Ms. Secret, 36, who had to leave
her own infant daughter with her mother while she served time in prison.

These days, Ms. Secret is thinking about passing her statistics class, not
how many ounces of cocaine to sell. She has reunited with her daughter,
Vincetta, now 7, and is working on building their relationship.

Ms. Secret's own background did not foreshadow a life of drugs and crime.
She was born into a middleclass family in Savannah, Ga. Her father was in
the Army, and the family moved frequently, to places like the Virgin
Islands, Nebraska and Delaware. Her parents have since divorced, and her
father is now a professor, her mother a nurse's aide and her stepmother a
lawyer. "My Mom and Dad never sold drugs or did drugs, and look what
happened to me," she said. "For a while, my daughter had a dope fiend for a
mother."

Ms. Secret started using cocaine while serving in the Army in Panama. After
she was honorably discharged in 1988, she couldn't keep a job, she said, so
she started selling cocaine to support her habit. Eventually, she was
arrested and served two habit. Eventually, she was arrested and served two
and a half year

In prison, Ms. Secret met the Rev. Benita Earle, who told her that God had
a higher calling for her. Eventually, Ms. Secret listened.

It was Ms. Earle who helped Ms. Secret get to a Veterans' Administration
hospital in Delaware for treatment when she was paroled.

She continued her treatment at the Diagnostic Rehabilitation Center in
Philadelphia.

"When she first came here, she was hurt, but she was open," said Ruby Hill,
her counselor in Philadelphia. "You could tell that she was spiritual, that
she had this sixth sense about her. I knew that if she reached way down,
she would be able to come through this and find some hope."

At the rehabilitation center, counselors suggested that Ms. Secret continue
her education at the Community College of Philadelphia. But when college
administrators told her she would have to take remedial classes, she
started crying.

"I was devastated," Ms. Secret said. "I was always the smart one in high
school."

But she studied religiously, graduating with a 4.0 grade average.

"I'm no rocket scientist," she said, "but I study, I talk with my
professors and I seek out people who can help me."

On the day of her visit to the high school class, Ms. Secret was asking
everyone she met on campus if they could help her with her statistics course.

"Sheila uses her voice," said Shirley Washington, the coordinator of ACT
NOW, a program offering counseling and tutoring to students at the college.
"There are many people on college campuses all across the country who have
undergone similar experiences. The difference between them and Sheila is
that ACT NOW, a program offering counseling and tutoring

It is difficult for Ms. Secret to walk across campus without someone
stopping her to talk or to ask advice. One vice president of the college
asked, half jokingly, if she could make some room on her schedule for a
meeting with him. Another student asked her about the math classes required
for graduation.

When she first enrolled at the college, Ms. Secret was living in a
Salvation Army shelter, trying to study at night amid loud conversations
and music. While in college, she also regained custody of her daughter.

Studying and being busy keep temptation at bay, Ms. Secret said. "I know my
weaknesses," she said. "I feel if I have too much time on my hands, perhaps
I'll go back to my old ways. Nobody told me the road is going to be easy,
but God didn't bring me this far to leave me."

When she is reminded of how far she has come, she lists her dreams of
getting a scholarship to a fouryear college, graduating and working with
women in prison to help them gain hope and job skills they can use when
they are released.

"People are not willing to give exconvicts a chance," she said. "If they
see someone like me who has made it, they might be more willing to help
them. I'm special, but I'm not unique. There are a lot of people like me.
I'm changed; I want to give something back to the community because I took
a lot from my community."

The teenagers at West Philadelphia University City High School seemed to
understand Ms. Secret's meaning. "I needed to hear her message this
morning," said Christine Chambers. "She fell down and got herself back up.
Not everybody can do that. It shows you that anything is possible if you
just keep the faith."