ASHBURN, Va. (7NEWS) — Washington Commander Bobby Wagner is striving for success on and off the football field.
Over the last two years, Wagner has been studying to obtain his MBA from Howard University.
When asked ‘Why Howard?” Wagner explained, “Why not?”
“I was doing a lot of work with HBCUs as a whole, and I got to walk on campus and see campus and see how beautiful it was, and, it’s one of the best business schools in the world and thought it would just be dope.,” Wagner told 7News.
Wagner also said the culture and community behind Historically Black Colleges and Universities were significant in choosing Howard.
The Commanders’ linebacker said he had great mentors around him during the beginning stages of his career to help guide him throughout his 14-year NFL career.
“You can’t really listen to what people are saying, because they’re not you at the end of your career and trying to figure stuff out. And so I’m hopefully trying to break that concept. I feel like you can master the field that you’re in and what you’re doing, and you can also learn and study other things,” Wagner added.
Wagner said during his MBA tenure, he was embraced by the HBCU culture.
“Seeing people that look like you, aspire to do not just business. I saw doctors, I saw lawyers, I saw journalists, I saw all different spectrums. And it was cool to see a lot of people that look like you, that have these different fields,” he said.
Attending business school, according to Wagner, was another stepping stone to emphasize how “how serious he was towards his next goals.”
“Sometimes, when you come from playing football and going into a business world, a lot of people feel like the reason why you’re able to get into those spaces is because of people that you know,” Wagner said.
“They feel like we skip steps, or they feel like we haven’t done the work; and so a lot of it is me showing how serious I am and wanting to cross over into that space, and to show I have done the work, and I’ve done the work,” he added.
Wagner’s accomplishment could be an inspiration for men in and out of the league who may be considering higher education.
My whole thing is pushing more than just sports, he said
Overall enrollment for Black men are significantly decreasing across HBCUs and collegiate institutions, according to a recent report from the American Institute for Boys and Men.
Black men account for only 26% of the students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, down from 38% in 1976, the report states.
Wagner believes the first step is exposure.
“My whole thing is pushing more than just sports; growing up, all I saw was entertainment and sports as an avenue to make it, per se, and part of the stuff that I do off the field is exposing young men and women to different things I wasn’t exposed to,” Wagner explained.
“I was only exposed to football, basketball, soccer, rapping, things of that nature; and trying to expose more of the youth to Google and Amazon and Microsoft and tech companies and VCs and private equity and all these different things that is a new world to a lot of people,” he said.
In the midst of obtaining his MBA, Wagner is also on the brink of making history.
The 11-time Pro Bowler only needs 25 more tackles to reach 2,000 in his career. But one thing is for certain, he has surprised himself during this entire journey.
“The growth has probably been as much off the field.” Commanders Head Coach Dan Quinn told media following Thursday’s practice. “If you follow us around the building, you might see him eating lunch with somebody on offense…he’s willing to share his wisdom with the others.”
The other players’ development is partially due to Wagner’s example, according to Quinn,
“It is the most elite part of his game and he is the 1-percenter as a tackler,” Quinn said. “It’s remarkable to see.”
As Wagner leads on and off the field, he’s not opposed to sharing or receiving knowledge.
I like education, he said
“If I would have went back and told my younger self that I would do this, I would have never done this,” Wagner said. “I would have been surprised, because that was the one thing I did not like in college, was going to school and playing ball. But I think being intentional about what you want, I think, is something I learned. I like education.”
