At fifteen years old Tavaris Sanders vowed to change his life from the cell of a juvenile detention center. Three years later, after shuffling from group homes to foster homes, he has earned a full academic scholarship to Connecticut College.  Three Bags Full narrates his struggle to hurdle the social, academic, and cultural barriers that come with success in higher education in America. 

This is Tavaris Sander’s story. It is his lived truth and not mine. As such he will narrate the story, in his own words. This piece was published in the Chronicle of Higher Education and uses excerpts from a joint interview of Tavaris, which I conducted with a writer from the Chronicle, Lawrence Biemiller. The piece as published in the Chronicle of Higher Education and The Washington Post