When Malik Wade closes his eyes, it often has little to do with sleep. Instead, the San Francisco native visualizes an extraordinary world, one where the less fortunate succeed despite overwhelming odds, where impoverished urban youth recognize and push past the countless traps society sets for them, and where he rises from the smoldering ashes of his own destruction to erect an inspiring new existence for himself and the larger community.

[For more of this story, written by D. Amari Jackson, go to http://atlantablackstar.com/20...-community-champion/]