All around me, I see girls forced to become rat racers in the College Application Industrial Complex, the subculture where students must craft themselves into the perfect specimens for college admission and often lose their authenticity, love of learning, and sense of self in the process.

Intrinsic motivation is one of learning's most precious resources. It bolsters us to stick out the tough moments of a challenge and pursue what we love to do.

For generations, black children have been brought up to have a critical race consciousness, a framework for dealing with prejudice and discrimination, which helps inoculate them against the spiritual toxins they will almost certainly encounter as they come of age in our society.

In the so-called age of girl power, we have failed to cut loose our most regressive standards of female success - like pleasing others and looking sexy - and to replace them with something more progressive - like valuing intelligence and hard work.

Growing up on a family farm, I know firsthand the challenges of running a small business... challenges that only seem to be growing for today's entrepreneurs.

I know I'm really lucky to do what I do, but sometimes with the hours and the travelling, I don't get to see my family and friends as much as I'd like. It can be lonely on the road. Sometimes I come offstage after a massive adrenaline rush, and then when I go to an empty hotel room on my own, it can be an anti-climax.

In 1986, when I was 21, I lived in Tokyo for four months, boarding with a Japanese family and working for an American company.

Technically, I'm a knight. My family goes back a thousand years in the Naples area. We're a titled, noble people.