In her own words: Jami Miscik's path to the CIA


A lot of people wonder what drew Jami Miscik, the fastest-rising woman in the history of the CIA, to the spy agency. Here's her story, in her own words:

When I was an undergraduate at Pepperdine University, in Malibu, California, I volunteered to tutor in a maximum security prison for juvenile offenders. These are the guys whose crimes would have landed them in Folsom or San Quentin. But because they were juveniles, they wound up at a place in the Santa Monica Mountains benignly called Camp David Gonzales.

Anyway, long story short, I became the "cool" tutor because in teaching long division to my 16-year-old charge (who was in for participating in his second drive-by shooting and who had been shot himself), I asked him where he wanted to "go" on a hypothetical trip. "Las Vegas," he said. We went through what kind of car he wanted to drive there. How fast he wanted to go. And then we did the math problem: How long would it take him to get there, dividing miles by speed. We did the same for gambling at the tables, and so on.

Over the next few weeks, the kid started to open up and tell me about himself and about his gang activities. One day, I asked him how he decided which gang to join: Was it based on where he lived, where he went to school, or what? He floored me when he said, "Oh, I just joined the one my mother was in."

I remember thinking that he probably grew up 15 miles away from where I did, in Redondo Beach, and what incredibly different experiences and influences we had. I extrapolated that into what differences there must be in the world, based on our different experiences. And I became intrigued with the need to understand other cultures before you can ever begin to understand international issues. A few years later, after I got my Masters degree at the University of Denver's School of International Studies, I ditched the idea of a New York banking career to join the CIA. I stayed 22 years. Now that I'm at Lehman Brothers, I realize that I have invaluable international perspective. How strange that it started with a wayward kid in the Santa Monica Mountains.

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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.