Page 38 - Voices-2022-02

FIELD NOTES

The Tonya Johnson Story
Education Will Set You Free: An

Inspiring Journey from Poverty to

Purpose

A couple of months ago, Tonya “TJ” Johnson was a guest speaker
at Wallmasters International. Her bubbly, vivacious personality

made her a welcomed guest at our early Friday morning meeting.
TJ’s inspirational story prompted me to ask her if I could share it
with our readers. What follows is her story, published by Excellerate along with her update after joining
Pfizer Pfree Speech Toastmasters Club and serving as the VP Education. Interview published by Excellerate

and reprinted with permission

Tonya Johnson grew up in poverty and went on on the nights when the family couldn’t afford
to become a leader in her field. Now, she’s living to pay the power bill, the kids would study by
her purpose, serving patients and uplifting others candlelight instead.

through education. Walking to school, TJ would hide her books
When Tonya Johnson—better known to and take shortcuts to avoid the bullies who picked
her friends as TJ—recalls her childhood, she on her because she was smart and studied hard.
remembers constantly feeling hungry. “They thought we were trying to be better than

As the second oldest of seven children everyone else.”
growing up in a low-income neighborhood in That could not be farther from the truth.
Newark, New Jersey, life was not easy. Her mother Humility was woven in the fabric of TJ’s
pieced together a living working in the school being before she even understood what it

cafeteria and cleaning houses, but the family’s meant. She did not consider herself better—
cupboards were often bare and bills sometimes she simply wanted a better way out of her
went unpaid. circumstances.
Still, TJ’s mother believed in a better future Her work paid off when, years later, TJ

for her children. An enthusiastic reader herself, graduated with her PharmD from Rutgers
she knew that the path to that future started with University. Her mother watched from the
a good education. audience with tears of joy streaming down
She had a message she would repeat to her her face. During that time, her mom and

kids everyday before school: “Education is the grandmother had also gone back to school to
key; Education will set you free!” get degrees from Seton Hall and Essex County
TJ and her siblings followed their mother’s Community College, respectively.
advice and pursued education relentlessly. Even TJ never forgot her humble beginnings. In her

38 ONE COMMUNITY