There he is, a typical Notre Dame student: Product of Catholic elementary and high schools, altar boy, strong athlete. He's got a respectable GPA, a nice girlfriend, a budding social conscience, big plans for the future. The right stuff.
That, however, is where the standard profile ends, because Isaac Duncan does not come from ordinary circumstances. Home is no comfortable suburb but the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, sometimes known as "Do or Die Bed-Sty," one of the country's most infamous crime and drug capitals. Isaac's future is not law school or a Big Eight accounting job. It involves a return to the neighborhood to become a teacher, to "give back a little of what was given to me."
Like most Notre Dame students, Isaac acknowledges the advantages he's had in life -- he just defines "advantages" a little differently than most. "The way I look at it," says the son of Cuban immigrants, "I've been fortunate to not have too much. I never had it to begin with, so I'll never miss it. I can live modestly and happily. I'm free."
Isaac isn't waiting for a diploma to begin his teaching career. With his fluent Spanish, he's become a regular at Saint Stephen's, a Holy Cross parish on South Bend's West Side that serves a mainly Mexican and African-American community.
In the summer following his freshman year, Isaac had over 25 kids between the ages of 5 and 10 under his wing when he worked as a counselor at El Campito, a day care project run through Saint Stephen's to serve working families in the neighborhood. "I am a tough teacher," he says, "but these kids listen to me. A lot of them have fathers; a lot of them don't. I think I can be a good role model."
Isaac has "hung out" at Saint Stephen's ever since. Between his sophomore and junior year he was interim director for Youth Ministry there. Last fall he continued that work through an academic internship. The Youth Group, teens aged 14 to 17, gathers twice a week for anything from serious discussions about school or parental authority to playing basketball or swimming at Notre Dame.
Though the internship is over, Isaac is still on the job as a volunteer. "I have a commitment to these kids," he says. "Other people might say they are gang kids, but I know they're good kids from good families that work hard."
All immigrant groups take a turn getting "trashed," says Isaac; gangs are a way to foster a sense of belonging to something. He tries to reinforce their pride in an Hispanic identity by talking about common issues and just simply speaking Spanish, though the barriers are many. "On TV all they hear is English, their parents encourage them to 'adapt' to the new country by speaking English," he says. "Also, government laws such as California's Proposition 187 encourage Hispanics to blend in to avoid scrutiny."
The Notre Dame junior plans to complete a five-year double major in graphic design and education. Unlike many students, he did not pine from birth to come to Notre Dame. Patrick Conlin '87, Isaac's high school English teacher, encouraged him to apply. Isaac thought he could never pay for a Notre Dame education, but Conlin told him to worry first about getting in, then about paying for it. Notre Dame offered a scholarship package attractive enough to woo him away from other schools.
He has found limitations at the University. "There's not much variety in art history," he says; "we just skipped by African and Asian art." But he sought out the material on his own because, as a teacher, "it will be important that I know these traditions. Inner-city kids need to understand how their people helped out. If I don't know, I'll be failing them."
Working with teenagers is becoming a way of life for Isaac. This summer he hopes to be a counselor in the National Sports Youth Program, an NCAA-sponsored project that will bring 200 urban youths to Notre Dame campus for a six-week agenda that includes educational enrichment, sports, and a drug and alcohol awareness program.
Even without a teaching degree, Isaac functions as an educator of sorts in his Notre Dame classes. "When an issue such as welfare reform or homosexuality or race relations comes up in class, all eyes pretty much turn to me for the minority point of view," he says. "It's okay with me, because I figure 'Who else is going to do it?' When I came here my dad said, 'Be the best person you can be. You're representing all of us.'"
Still, he concedes, "I am different from the norm here at Notre Dame. I've lost friends to drugs and violence, I have friends who've grown up on welfare. I have lots of gay friends. I take the liberal stance on most issues because I know how it is to be a minority and be different."
He's got a good role model. "Jesus hung out with the lowlifes," he says. He advises anyone who would denounce prostitutes, murderers and thieves to "start reading your Scripture before you start waving your flag."