Early Life and Education
Stephanopoulos was born in Fall River, Massachusetts, to Greek immigrants, Robert George and Nickolitsa ("Nikki") Gloria (née Chafos) Stephanopoulos. His father is a Greek Orthodox priest and Dean Emeritus of the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York City, and his mother was for many years director of the national news service of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. Young George also became a follower of his parents' faith and long considered entering the priesthood himself.
Following some time in Purchase, New York, Stephanopoulos attended suburban Cleveland, Ohio's Orange High School, where he wrestled competitively. In 1982, he received his bachelor of arts degree in political science from Columbia University in New York, where he was a sports broadcaster for WKCR-FM, the university's radio station. Stephanopoulos was the salutatorian of his class and was also awarded a Harry S. Truman Scholarship.
Stephanopoulos's father always wanted his son to become a lawyer, if not a priest. Promising him he would attend law school eventually, George took a job as an aide to Cleveland congressman Ed Feighan in Washington, D.C.. Though he rose to Feighan's chief of staff, Stephanopoulos agreed to cede to his father's wishes and attend law school if he succeeded in a second attempt to earn a Rhodes Scholarship after having been rejected for the Rhodes Scholarship during his senior year at Columbia. He earned a M.A. in Theology at Balliol College. He maintains he spent much of his time trying to root his political leanings in the deeper philosophies that he studied there.
Read more about this topic: George Stephanopoulos
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or education:
“Quintilian [educational writer in Rome around A.D. 100] thought that the earliest years of the child’s life were crucial. Education should start earlier than age seven, within the family. It should not be so hard as to give the child an aversion to learning. Rather, these early lessons would take the form of play—that embryonic notion of kindergarten.”
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“Thrillers are like life—more like life than you are ... it’s what we’ve all made of the world.”
—Graham Greene (1904–1991)
“An acquaintance with the muses, in the education of youth, contributes not a little to soften the manners. It gives a delicate turn to the imagination, and a kind of polish to the mind in severer studies.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)