Anna Roberts

Anna Roberts was born in upstate New York and her family moved frequently throughout her childhood. Her maternal grandparents were from Switzerland and her paternal grandparents were from the Virgin Islands. Roberts studied sociology and urban education at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and worked at the Relay Graduate School of Education in Manhattan.

"All of the places that I grew up, they were mostly suburban, mostly white neighborhoods. In general, our family looked a lot different than most of the other families that lived in the area.  I definitely think that we were probably one of the only mixed families in upstate New York; and definitely Hudson, Massachusetts; and definitely in Larchmont, New York. Not as much in Philly, because we were in the city, and so there was more racial diversity there. And definitely in Maryland, where we are now... In Larchmont, I remember, I was around nine when we moved there and my brother was three, at that point. My mom would be taking us around, and we definitely got asked a couple of times if she was our babysitter and not our mom, which was interesting."