One on one
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By Tiffany Jackson
While walking the halls at Wilmer-Hutchins High School in Dallas during the 80’s, Rickey Dixon was doing just enough to get by. Coming from a single-parent home after his father died, Dixon’s mother worked hard to raise five kids in a three bedroom home. Never learning the importance of education, Dixon was always taught how to survive by his mother but little did he know at that time that receiving an education was the real way to survive. The former NFL player talks to DallasGospelConnection about how he was able to move out of darkness into the marvelous light.
“When I was in high school I was like a lot of these kids today without goals and without dreams,” said Dixon. “I was not prepared for college when I got out of high school.”
Dixon was still fortunate enough to receive a scholarship to play defensive back for Oklahoma University as an Oklahoma Sooners in 1984. Soon after he was drafted to the National Football League where he played for the Cincinnati Bengals and Los Angeles Raiders.
“I was so far behind that I told Berry Switzer that I needed a tutor,” said Dixon. “I spent three or four hours a night getting extra help. People started saying that I was not going to make it. It took this new environment for me to see that I needed to take education seriously.”
Dixon left Oklahoma, eight hours short of receiving a Communication degree but during his college years, Dixon was a key figure in winning several National Championships, the Orange Bowl and as All-American he was the first Sooner to win the Jim Thorpe Award. Dixon finished his career with 170 total tackles and 17 interceptions (second only to Darrell Royal for the school record). During his senior year he had nine interceptions for 232 yards which remain school records for the Sooners, but this still did not satisfy Dixon. Dixon decided that he was not going to speak for several years until he received his degree.
“I am speaking now because I went back to school to Paul Quinn College and graduated but it was only through God and my determination to finish,” protested Dixon.”
Dixon made two promises or goals that he said he wanted to accomplish in life and that was to coach and then to become a motivational speaker. He has coached for 10 years and now he is prepared to speak to kids throughout the Dallas/Ft. Worth area.
“Now I have peace,” said Dixon. “When you are at peace, you can become successful in whatever you are doing. I have made a change and have adapted. I can remember riding to college in tears and my mom saying son you don’t have to go but I said I had to go. I saw my mom working in the rain, sleet and snow and I did not want her to do it any longer.”
“Like T.D. Jakes says, “you have to re-position yourself, continued Dixon. “I see kids all the time and it is easy to pick out the ones that remind me of how I was and that is why it is time to speak out because I have a testimony. I don’t tell them that I am a former NFL player, I show them. Kids have to see things to believe them. I also tell them about how I struggled for years.
For 10 years, Dixon has worked with the Dallas Independent School District and currently he is working with a man by the name of Dr. Terry who has been in the education system for 30 years with the development of Dr. T’s & Associates Violence Prevention and Anger Management program.
“We plan to go into the DISD administrations and courts to implement the program to help kids with violence and anger management,” said Dixon.
The program is curriculm based and according to Dr. Terry there are 300 to 500 clients already wating for the August opening.
“I want to make a difference in these kids life and so far I have not had any problems because I am able to relate with them in a way that many people can’t,” said Dixon. “I tell them how it is. God has blessed me with the ability to talk to them. I have move from the darkness into the light and I refuse to turn back.”
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