Shirlee Smith is a children's

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, an opinion

columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (newspaper), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the fo ...

and author, and currently the producer and host of her own television show
"Talk About Parenting with Shirlee Smith"
which debuted in 1994. Smith first gained the public's attention when her

social issues A social issue is a problem that affects many people within a society. It is a group of common problems in present-day society and ones that many people strive to solve. It is often the consequence of factors extending beyond an individual's cont ...

column debuted in the Pasadena Star News in the late 1980s. She is the parent of four adult daughters and a teenage foster daughter, and has three grandsons and one great-granddaughter.

Early life

Born in Los Angeles, CA, Shirlee is the second of Bernice and Eugene Pickett's four children. Bernice was a domestic and sometimes a "live-in"; Eugene was a waiter on the

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and sometimes a waiter in fashionable Los Angeles restaurants. Early years were on the west side of Los Angeles, she attended the 37th Street Elementary School. The family then moved to Boyle Heights, to the home of Lily Pickett, the fraternal grandmother. Here, Shirlee attended sixth grade a
First Street School
Next wa
Robert Louis Stevenson Middle School
where Shirlee and sister Beverlee were two of only four African American students at the school. Shirlee graduated from Theodore Roosevelt High School in 1954. She attended Los Angeles City College where she majored in

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and met her first husband. The marriage fell apart after the birth of their second daughter, she moved back home with her mom, who quickly found Shirlee a small house of her own to rent. Shirlee applied for welfare, then married her second husband and had four more children. Her second child died in 1959, at the age of two, due to sickle cell disease. Her fourth child, her only son, died in 1983 as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. The couple separated when Smith was 30. Smith has fostered "a dozen" infants. She enrolled at

Pasadena City College Pasadena City College (PCC) is a Public college, public community college in Pasadena, California. History Pasadena, California, Pasadena City College was founded in 1924 as Pasadena Junior College. From 1928 to 1953, it operated as a four- ...

, then graduated from UCLA.

Career path

Newspaper columns

Since 1980, Smith has written opinion columns in the Pasadena Star News andSan Gabriel Valley
newspapers. Her columns have also appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Oakland Tribune, the Los Angeles Sentinel, and th
Pasadena Weekly

Cable TV show host and producer

In 1994, with a small grant from the "City of Pasadena

she launched the cable television program "Talk About Parenting

which became a non-profit organization in 1997. According to The Root (magazine), Smith "takes a no-nonsense approach to raising happy, balanced children." Smith founded the charity, Talk About Parenting.

Book

Smith is author of “They’re Your Kids, Not Your Friends", published in English in 2001 (Sorin Press) and in Spanish in 2005, "Son Tus Hijos, No Tus Amigos"(Panorama Press.

References

External links

*
2010 appearance
on

Dr. Phil Phillip Calvin McGraw (born September 1, 1950), better known as Dr. Phil, is an American television personality and author best known for hosting the talk show '' Dr. Phil''. He holds a doctorate in clinical psychology, though he ceased rene ...

KCET Local Hero
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Shirlee Living people American columnists Writers from California University of California, Los Angeles alumni Year of birth missing (living people)