{"id":24,"date":"2016-08-10T17:56:22","date_gmt":"2016-08-10T17:56:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/?p=24"},"modified":"2016-08-10T17:56:22","modified_gmt":"2016-08-10T17:56:22","slug":"charles-ross-71","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/2016\/08\/10\/charles-ross-71\/","title":{"rendered":"Charles Ross \u201971"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Williston
Williston gave the future businessman a chance to chart his own path. Photo courtesy of Michael Esposito<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The transition from his home coun\u00adtry of Liberia was a difficult one for Charles Ross, who had to adjust to a new environment and new faces. At Williston, though, the shy student became a confident tennis team manager and mathematician. Mr. Ross, who says he\u2019s now in his \u201csec\u00adond career,\u201d is the finance director of the NFL Players Association.<\/p>\n

What did you try at Williston that pushed you out of your comfort zone? <\/strong><\/p>\n

For sports, I tried just about every\u00adthing, baseball, hockey\u2014I gave ev\u00aderything a try. I wanted to see what I might become passionate about. I wanted to try drama, but didn\u2019t have enough nerve. My public speaking confidence was quite low. In the end, I played soccer and basketball, and I enjoyed managing the varsity tennis team. Tennis has remained an interest for me, and I plan on attending all four Grand Slams at some point.<\/p>\n

Did you discover the passion you were looking for? What was it? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Math has always been my favorite subject, and I knew whatever I would do would include numbers. Beyond that, it was a very difficult decision. As a practical matter, there were many options but I<\/p>\n

ended up taking the business route. I majored in accounting, became a CPA, and eventually went on to law school. I knew whatever I wanted to do, I needed to be passionate about. It was really an endeavor on my part to find that.<\/p>\n

Can you describe the dorm culture? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Dorm life was new to me, but over\u00adall it was fun. It was a great group of guys. Ed Pytka \u201971 was my room\u00admate and we have remained friends. I am looking forward to seeing him at next year\u2019s alumni Reunion. I recall the dorm master was a former military man who lived down the hall with his family. He was a good authoritative figure, but gave us enough latitude to be boys and have fun without being self-destructive. There were many pranks involving water bags and tampering with your bed sheets, mostly harmless pranks.<\/p>\n

What was going on in the world around you? <\/strong><\/p>\n

It was a very difficult time actu\u00adally: the Vietnam War; the military draft, which affected my peer group. Everyone was worried, wondering \u2018Am I going to get drafted?\u2019 Also, I remember the Biafran War in Ni\u00adgeria, which was closer to home for me. Nigeria also had a mandatory military draft system. It certainly caused me to think about how I would respond if I were drafted. It was also 1968, which was not long after Martin Luther King, Jr.\u2019s assas\u00adsination. There was racial tension. Nothing that I felt person\u00adally, but it was certainly in the news and in the newspapers. I would spend weekends in New York, and really felt it when I was there.<\/p>\n

Can you describe yourself as a teenager? <\/strong><\/p>\n

I started coming out of my shell at Williston. I was a shy kid. I was the middle child of five. My two older siblings were very outgoing with a lot of friends. So Williston gave me an identity. When you are the third one growing up, you feel like you have to play a certain role. But at Williston, I was the first one, so I got to chart my own path.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The transition from his home coun\u00adtry of Liberia was a difficult one for Charles Ross, who had to adjust to a new environment and new faces. At Williston, though, the shy student became a confident tennis team manager and mathematician. Mr. Ross, who says he\u2019s now in his \u201csec\u00adond career,\u201d is the finance director of … Continue reading Charles Ross \u201971<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6],"class_list":["post-24","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-charles-ross-71"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24\/revisions\/70"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/profiles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}