What's Condi Up To These Days?

By Alicia Cruz

Senior writer

The Black Urban Times

It's not crystal clear what she's up to, but whatever she's doing, she's looking good while she's doing it. In this July 2009 photo, Condoleezza Rice looks absolutely elegant in red as she walks the red carpet at the 17th Annual ESPY Awards in Los Angeles, California.

{Photos courtesy of Albert L. Ortega}

They say that her name, Condolezza, is derived from the Italian musical expression, Con dolcezza, which means "with sweetness" and I believe them. I spoke to a friend from college last week who was in LA for the ESPY Awards red carpet gala and she got to chat it up with Miss Rice and said Rice is "extremely down-to-earth and very sweet."

In this second photo, Rice is photographed in a classic black evening dress as she arrived at 'Glamour' magazine's 2008 Women of the Year Awards held at Carnegie Hall in New York City.

{Photo courtesy of Johns PkI / Splash News}

BIOGRAPHY

Miss Condi is the only child of the late Reverend John Wesley Rice, Jr., and Angelena Rice. Condi was born in Birmingham, Alabama and raised in the Titusville neighborhood.

Her father was a guidance counselor at a local High School as well as a Presbyterian minister at the Westminster Church, which had been founded by his father. Condi's mother was a science, music, and oratory teacher at the same High School where Condi's father worked.

In 1967, Condi's family moved to Denver, Colorado where she attended St. Mary's Academy, a private all-girls Catholic high school in Cherry Hills Village, Colorado. She graduated in 1970.

Later, Miss Rice enrolled at the University of Denver, where her father served as both an assistant dean and an instructor. He taught a class called "The Black Experience in America." Dean John Rice opposed institutional racism, government oppression, and the Vietnam War.

Rice earned her Bachelor of Arts in political science from the University of Denver in 1974, at age 19. She pledged Phi Beta Kappa. In 1975, she obtained her Master's Degree in political science from the University of Notre Dame.

Miss Rice made her professional debut into the political arena in 1977 when she went to work for the Department of State during the Carter administration as an intern in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. In 1981, at the age of 26, she received her PhD in Political Science from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver. Her dissertation along with some of her earliest publications, centered on military policy and politics in Czechoslovakia. Talk about being a beauty and a brain! You go, Condi!
POST BUSH

Fast forward to 2009 post-Bush administration, the former Secretary of State signed on as a client of The William Morris Agency in January 2009. The former professor and Stanford University provost was once named one of the most powerful women in the world by Forbes magazine. She came in at number seven.

WMA co-chief operating officer Wayne Kabak said that the agency was struck not only by Miss Rice's well-rounded resume and her political career, but by her other accomplishments such as her being an accomplished concert pianist as well as a big-time National Football League fan. "It's more than just books, it's much more than just lectures," Kaback said. "We're here to help her create and enhance an agenda that is very important to her in her post-government career."

While Miss Rice is not a professional pianist, she still practices often and plays with a chamber music group. She put her early childhood pianist training at the Aspen Music Festival and School to good use when she accompanied cellist Yo-Yo Ma for Brahms's Violin Sonata in D Minor at Constitution Hall in April 2002 for the National Medal of Arts Awards.

During her tenure as the the 66th United States Secretary of State and later, the National Security Advisor under the Bush administration, Rice appeared on the Time 100, Time magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people, four times. Later, she graced the pages of Forbes and made us all proud when, in 2004 and 2005, she was ranked as the most powerful woman in the world by Forbes (second to the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel).

Rice made great strides during her tenure as the Secretary of State and NSA as she struggled to bring peace to the Middle East, and prevent more terrorist attacks. Rice was also an outspoken proponent of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.