Santa Fe lawyer thanks retiring NBA star Dwyane Wade for paying college tuition

“The scholarship was one of my greatest blessings,” said Johnson, 27. “It gave me an opportunity to have a life that I never thought was possible, and it put me on a completely different path than I ever thought I’d be on.”

Now Johnson, a 2010 graduate of Pojoaque Valley High School, is helping pay tribute to the 13-time NBA All-Star in the twilight of his career.

In advance of Wade’s last regular-season home game Tuesday night, Budweiser released an emotional four-minute video honoring Wade’s career-spanning philanthropic efforts. In it, Johnson joins four others whose lives have been touched by Wade’s humanity and generosity.

One woman recalls how Wade rushed to assist her family in the aftermath of a tragedy. When the family’s home burned down, destroying everything they owned, Wade took them on a shopping spree.

Another man remembers Wade’s mentorship. Much like Wade, who grew up poor in a gang-controlled neighborhood in Chicago, the man came from “an area where not too many people make it.”

Wade’s mother, who struggled to overcome a drug addiction and served time in prison, also makes a touching tribute to her son.

For Johnson, Wade’s assistance was transformational.

“It was always my dream that I’d get the chance to go to college, but we just didn’t have the money,” Johnson tells Wade in the video. “… You completely changed the course of my life.”

In a phone interview Tuesday, Johnson, the daughter of a retired Santa Fe police captain and an administrator at Los Alamos National Laboratory, said she likely could have gone to college in state but that the scholarship, administered by Marquette and the Boys and Girls Club of America, broadened her opportunities.

Starting at age 9, Johnson attended the Pueblo of Pojoaque Boys & Girls Club every day after school. In eighth grade, she received the Youth of the Year Award. That qualified her, as a senior, to apply for Marquette’s Boys and Girls Club Youth of the Year Scholarship, which funded the full cost of her undergraduate tuition.

Donald Christy, former executive director of the Pojoaque club, said he was “blown away” when he learned she’d won such a coveted award. But Johnson, he said, more than deserved it.

“She’s just a really special person, and God has blessed her tremendously,” Christy said. “She always thinks of everybody else before she thinks of herself.”

Each year at Marquette, from which Johnson graduated in 2014, Wade would visit his scholarship recipients. On the first day of her freshman year, he showed up to take his charges on a campus tour. The next year, they all went bowling.

“He’s very down to earth, incredibly humble, and very generous and caring,” she remembered. “He really took time when he was there to see how we were doing and how we were adjusting. I always felt like he really wanted us to succeed.”

Johnson went on to graduate from Marquette University Law School in 2017. Soon thereafter, she nabbed a job at the Santa Fe law firm of Walther, Bennett, Mayo, Honeycutt.

Johnson said she received a call a couple of weeks ago from Wade’s sister, who runs his Wade’s World Foundation. She asked if Johnson would be willing to fly to Miami to film the video. Johnson jumped at the chance.

It was “a once-in-a-lifetime experience,” she said. “I was grateful to have the opportunity to say ‘thank you’ to Dwyane Wade for the difference he’s made in my life.”

At the end of the video, Wade, who has spent his final NBA season exchanging jerseys with other standout players, had a chance to trade for more sentimental items.

Johnson gifted him her graduation cap and gown. In return, Johnson received one of Wade’s jerseys, signed specifically for her.

“My college career, he played such a special part in it,” Johnson said.