After matriculating at University of California at Berkeley, where he earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education while playing on the basketball team, Dr. Smith was able to fuse his passion for education and sport. Dr. Smith completed his Cultural Studies in Education Ph.D. at The University of Texas at Austin 2015. Thereafter he conducted post- doctoral research in Spanish at UT’s Mesoamerica Center in Antigua, Guatemala, studying the amalgamation of race, culture, education, and athletics, which he continues to research. His work has been published in the Journal of Urban Education and The Journal of Race, Gender and Class.