What was condoleezza rice childhood like

Rice was selected as the Provost of Stanford in , making her the first woman and first African American to hold this position. Under her leadership, Rice led the university out of a financial deficit. While at Stanford, she also co-founded the Center for a New Generation, an after-school program for underprivileged students.

Throughout her time teaching, Rice actively pursued a career in politics. In , she advised President George H. Bush, becoming the first black woman to hold this position. She was the first African American woman to hold this position. In her role, Rice worked to promote peace globally.

She placed American diplomats throughout the Middle East, especially in areas of major turmoil. Rice also aided in peace talks with other countries. Rice also works tirelessly to educate the public on international relations. In , when her appointment as Secretary of State ended, Rice returned to teaching.

She has published several books including her two autobiographies. She also serves on the board of several companies including the Boys and Girls Club. Although she did not pursue a career as a musician, Rice continues to play the piano. She also supports the arts through several charities.

While working in Washington DC, Rice took up golfing as a leisure activity. In , her leisure activity gained her another first. She became one of the first female members admitted to Augusta National Golf Club, an organization that had excluded women for 80 years.

In the mids, Rice spent a period in Washington, D. Bush during the dissolution of the Soviet Union and German reunification. A few years later, in , Rice was appointed national security adviser by President George W.

Bush , becoming the first African American woman and woman to hold the post. She went on to become the first African American woman to serve as U. Secretary of State — she became the nation's 66th Secretary of State in , following Colin Powell 's resignation, and served from to As Secretary of State, Rice dedicated her department to "Transformational Diplomacy," with a mission of building and sustaining democratic, well-governed states around the world and the Middle East in particular.

To that end, she relocated American diplomats to such hardship locations as Iraq, Afghanistan and Angola, and required them to become fluent in two foreign languages. She also created a high-level position to defragment U. The event was monumental: The Augusta National Golf Club, which opened in , had infamously been known for its all-male membership and repeated failure to admit women.

Rice delivered a riveting speech on the second day of the convention, spurring positive media attention: "I think my father thought I might be president of the United States. I think he would've been satisfied with secretary of state.

I'm a foreign policy person and to have a chance to serve my country as the nation's chief diplomat at a time of peril and consequence, that was enough," she said, adding that her future plans focus on being an educator, not a politician.

But my life is in Palo Alto. She came to know a foreign policy expert, Brent Scowcroft — , and was offered her first official job in government. Scowcroft had been named national security adviser by George H.

Bush — , who was elected president in Scowcroft then hired Rice as a staff member on the National Security Council. The National Security Council helps analyze data and plan American foreign policy. It looks at potential global threats from hostile nations, and works to make strategic alliances with friendly ones. Rice eventually became a special assistant to the first President Bush, serving as his expert on Soviet and East European affairs.

It was an important time in American foreign policy. The political system of the Soviet Union was crumbling, and by the Communist governments allied with Soviet Russia had been peacefully ousted throughout the Eastern Bloc as the communist nations in Eastern Europe were known. But Rice tired of the toll the White House job took on her personal life, and she resigned in She went back to teaching at Stanford, and in became the university's first-ever female provost, which essentially made her second-in-command at the school.

She was also the first African American to be selected for the position. She was charged with eliminating a large budget deficit, and the university had also been accused of misusing government grant money intended for military research. There was internal turmoil as well, and some faculty members complained about Rice's no-nonsense manner.

Rice remained on friendly terms with the Bush family and came to know one of the sons, George W. In George W. Bush decided to try and win the Republican Party's nomination as its presidential candidate for He hired Rice to lead his team of foreign policy advisers, and she quit the Stanford job.

She began working closely with Bush, who was governor of Texas at the time and had very little other political experience, especially in foreign relations. Bush won his party's nomination and later was declared the winner of a hotly contested November election.

The president-elect immediately named Rice as his national security adviser. Powell — , had held the job for a year in the late s—she was the first woman ever to serve in the position. The national security adviser helps shape American foreign policy, both on the public front and behind the scenes, in strategy sessions with the president and his team.

Rice's duties also included coming up with ideas to combat threats to American interests at home and overseas. This became an important part of her job on the morning of September 11, She was in a meeting at the White House when an aide notified her that a plane had struck the World Trade Center.

She quickly ended the meeting and notified the President, who was in Florida. After a second plane crashed into the other tower of the New York landmark, she and other key personnel gathered in what is known as the White House "Situation Room. Armed Forces, Rice and the others retreated to an underground bunker. The attack was the deadliest ever to occur on American soil. Rice worked long days in the months afterward to shape U.

The first order of business involved Afghanistan, which was suspected of harboring the shadowy Islamic fundamentalist group known as Al Qaeda. Less than a month later, U. Rice also worked to create a new policy for dealing with longtime Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein —.

The Bush White House believed that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that could be used against the United States. In March of the United States invaded Iraq. The fourth year of the Bush Administration was a difficult one for Rice and other top White House and Pentagon personnel. Though Hussein had been captured and the war in Iraq was officially declared over, U.

And American military operatives had yet to capture bin Laden. Reproduced by permission. There were charges that U.

Rice lives in a luxury apartment complex in Washington known as Watergate. Her mother died in , and her father died the same month that Bush named her to the national security adviser post. She attends church regularly, and is known to be close to the President and his wife, Laura —. At the Maryland presidential retreat known as Camp David, she has been known to watch hours of televised sports with President Bush.

Both are dedicated football fans, and Rice has also been known to spend an entire day on her own watching college and pro football games. Rice's name has been mentioned as a possible future vice-presidential candidate.