The character that I feel is inspirational to me is Oprah Winfrey. I choose Oprah Winfrey because she is a very inspirational person. She has leadership qualities such as emotional intelligence, humanist and relatable. She is emotionally intelligence because she is able to identify her own emotions and those of others. She is aware of others people problems in the world. She is an empathetic and caring person as she helps to change lives of thousands of people. She is also transparent with her life which makes people feel that she is relatable. She doesn’t hide anything in her life that had led her to where she is now. Her active contribution towards the society through her three main charities which are ‘The Angel Network’, ‘The Oprah Winfrey Foundation’ and ‘The Oprah Winfrey Operating Foundation’ showed her active contribution to give back to the society. She has donated millions of dollars of her own money to fund various interests and charities. Christina (n.d) agrees that Oprah has helped millions through these foundations and she highlights the importance of education for children.
‘The Angel Network’ charity focused on getting people around the world to make a difference in the lives of others. Oprah had used her show to advertise the charity as it’s vision is to inspire individuals to create opportunities that enable undeserved women and children to rise to their potential. It gave children access to education, develop leaders who will lead their communities, protect basic human rights and create community support. Whereas, ‘The Oprah Winfrey Foundation’ provides grants for non-profit organisations. This foundation is all funded by Oprah Winfrey and it includes education, learning and leadership development. Lastly, ‘The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy Foundation’ provides funds to operate the Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa. The foundation was set-up to provide funds for special projects or to make building repairs and improvements. However, Oprah has also donated to other charity organisations apart from those mentioned. She has dedicated her life to giving back to others.
From her accomplishments, I believe that she is a role model for us young women all over the world as she breaks gender stereotypes barriers. Her first and major accomplishment is the ‘Oprah Winfrey Show’ which ran for 25 seasons, an educational platform where she featured book clubs, self-improvement segments and philanthropic forays. Through this show, audience were able to share their problems with her because she was able to motivate them and give words of encouragement. From then on, she had started her own ‘Oprah’s Book Club’, charities and foundations. After rising from her past, she had achieved numerous awards such as the ‘Emmy Awards’, ‘People’s Choice Awards and the ‘Presidential Medal of Freedom’. She proved that woman can do just anything and our past does not determine our future.
The three experiences that Oprah had experienced was being sexually abuse, difficult childhood and lack of parental care and guidance. Oprah was born to a single parent and lived with her grandmother. She had a difficult childhood as her parents separated and had to move countless times from staying with her grandmother to mother and father which led to lack of parental care because she feels as if she is unwanted. Her grandmother was very strict and she also taught Oprah to read at the age of two years old. Then at 6 years old she stayed with her mother in poverty. The poor, urban lifestyle had a negative effect on Oprah as a teenager and she was later sexually abused by her relatives. At the age of 15 she ran away to live with her father. Her life changed from than on as she had guidance from her father that sent her to school. Her Father highlighted the importance of education and made her learn new vocabulary daily. In school she developed the confidence to make speeches in contests ad conferences. When she was offered a job by the ‘Nashville Columbia Broadcasting System’(CBS), she turned them down twice before she decided to accept which led her to being a host of the well known Oprah Winfrey show.
Based on her past story, I’ve learned to be resilience, positive and to always take up an opportunity. Oprah proved that our past experiences does not stop us from achieving more than what we can. Even though she grew from abuse, poverty and neglect she was able to break the barriers and figure out what she need to do to make her future better. She is able to handle what is thrown at her with confidence. According to Garson (2011), Oprah said “for every one of us that succeeds, it’s because there is somebody there to show you the way out, for me it was the teachers and school.” Oprah is also a positive person because she is able to think positively even though she had went through countless tough times that if it was any other person, they would have just gave up on their life. She also appreciates the people who were in her past like her grandmother, who always beat her even for the smallest thing she did. However, she appreciated her grandmother who taught her how to read at a very young age. Lastly, Oprah thought me that we should always take up any opportunities that comes to us because we should never waste any opportunity to improve or achieve more. Oprah had also taught me that opportunities can be life-changing. Elizabeth (2015) states that through opportunities Oprah was able to use what she learned from her past experiences to overcome her traumas which showed that those opportunities was a life-changer to Oprah.
I am able to connect these insights to my profession as an early childhood educator. Oprah’s charities and foundations highlighted the importance of education of children and she displays qualities like emotional intelligence which early childhood educators should have. As early childhood educators, we should be able to feel and understand the children needs and to take into consideration their abilities. Apart from that, she demonstrates caring, integrity and resilience. These are the important core values that early childhood educators should have. AECES (2015) agrees that caring, integrity and resilience are core values that early educators should embrace. Early childhood educators should care with a heart and demonstrate a good knowledge of child development. We should also work with integrity to gain trust and support of the child, family and community. Lastly, we should foster resilience with a strong support system in the face of challenges. Oprah had also stated that we should always take up any opportunities or challenges given to us. I can link this to myself as an early childhood educator because we will always have a few children that are always getting on our nerves or those who have difficulties in their development. Thus, I feel motivated to take up those challenges as there will be benefits after that. Oprah also said that one of the reason of her success was her teachers and school which as an early childhood educator, we should realise that we are an important part of every child’s life because we are the ones who will build on their foundation for their future.