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Fourteen-year-old Ron Mitchell shoots his last basket at a YMCA on Chicago’s South Side and makes his way home. His walk takes him through one of the city’s toughest neighborhoods. Before long, a young man approaches, takes out a gun and demands money.

Thinking quickly, Mitchell coaxes an uneasy conversation that wards off the robbery and reveals the would-be assailant as homeless and hungry. Mitchell, understanding the pain of poverty, invites the man home for dinner.

That encounter taught Mitchell the importance of speaking up and speaking out, a gift that would propel him from a rough neighborhood in Chicago to the boardroom of BEM Enterprises, LLC a global management consultant firm he founded to serve clients such as Verizon, Amazon, Microsoft, General Motors and the federal government.

After a stint in the U.S. Army, Mitchell received his bachelor’s degree from DePaul University and connected with the Council on Legal Education Opportunity, a nonprofit that recruits underrepresented students into law school.

Kevin Deasy, an associate professor emeritus in 51��Ʒ��Ƶ’s School of Law, recognized Mitchell’s potential and invited him to apply for a scholarship. Once on campus, Mitchell’s peers noticed him, too.

“He was like Santa Claus: omnipotent, ubiquitous,” says former classmate Shawn Buckner (LAW ’01), who now works at the Federal Reserve Board. “He was always willing to give a positive word and, by extension, be a bright light.”

After graduating from 51��Ʒ��Ƶ Law, Mitchell moved to Atlanta, where he earned an MBA degree by attending Emory and Clark Atlanta universities simultaneously and launched BEM, also known as Team Ignite. Last summer, he began a new venture traveling across the globe to share information and inspiration with small businesses and entrepreneurs about sustainability.

All along, says Mitchell (LAW ’02), he’s seen his work as a larger assignment to inspire change. “People don’t know what they can do, until they do it. That’s why I’m using my voice to help people achieve the unthinkable.”