Name of case study student has been changed to protect identity
From Juié á Yeaínah to Teresa Kippler
“An In-Depth Look at the Transition of a Fifteen Year Old Refuge Female from Ivory Coast Liberia to Lansing, Michigan.”
Adam Clements
December 4th 2008
TE 291 A – Adie Slaton
Michigan State University
“An In-Depth Look at the Transition of a Fifteen Year Old Refuge Female from Ivory Coast Liberia to Lansing, Michigan.”
Adam Clements
December 4th 2008
TE 291 A – Adie Slaton
Michigan State University
"You Kinda Crazy”
The First Day I Met Teresa
While I believe that everyone has a story, the one that Teresa Kippler told me about her first thirteen years of life and the three that have since followed cannot even be described in one word but only as a list of many; inspirational, heartbreaking, joyful, frustrating, hopeful, overwhelming, emotional, the list goes on. I met Teresa on October 23rd 2008 while volunteering at the Refugee Development Center, or the RDC, in East Lansing, Michigan.
“The greater Lansing area is home to a large population of refugees from all corners of the world. Many of these individuals have suffered grave injustices and lived in places where they had little to no control over their lives. They have lost family, friends, homes and entire communities to greed. Most refugees will receive assistance for six months. After this support expires, however, they are left in unfamiliar surroundings in a country that is still foreign to them. They often have little money, few contacts, and a limited understanding of America’s vast and complex culture. That is where the Refugee Development Center comes in. With the help of volunteers and community partners we provide refugees with the skills they need to succeed” (RDC, 2008).
The RDC is located at 122 S. Pennsylvania Ave. in an older stone building built as a church. Then in 2002 the entire third floor and many of the offices were designated solely to the RDC program with the mission to “provide the education and support refugees need to become self-sufficient members of society” (RDC, 2008). Our teacher education class at Michigan State University had been working with the RDC for the past few months now, and up until that day, my experiences hadn’t been anything “great.” Because of some rough starts, a lack of organization at first, and just a little bit of overall confusion, the program simply hadn’t been running as smoothly as we had hoped. So on that particular Thursday, I went up stairs to where I usually tutor, but there weren’t very many students there yet, or if they were there they already had someone helping them. So I waited, and a few minutes later, a girl walked in and sat down. She was shorter than me, but then again just about everyone is shorter than you when you are six foot five. I would say she was just about five feet. She had dark brown skin, dark brown eyes, and dark brown braided hair with a few dyed blonde streaks through it tied back. After a few minutes of getting settled in and then finishing up a conversation with one of her friends, she pulled out her books, sat them down on the wooden table, looked around, and saw me.
“Could you help me with my homework?” She asked.
“Sure.” I answered. I was just excited to be able to do something. I came over and sat down next to her at the table. “I’m Adam. What’s your name?”
“Teresa.”
“Nice to meet you Teresa. So what are you working on?”
“This.” She handed me a couple pieces of paper about a contest for poetry and prose/essay writing. I read through it and it sounded really neat. You could submit two poems and one essay. The winners got published in a magazine and they also got a cash award prize. I asked her which she would like to try first, the poetry or the prose. She said she needed help writing a poem. YES! I was so excited. My English class just finished our poetry unit, and I personally love poetry.
“So what do you know about poetry?” I asked her.
“Well, I know what a poem is, but I have never written one.”
“What grade are you in?” I asked because I was really surprised. She looked like she was about seventeen years old so I would be surprised if she had made it through most of high school and never was exposed to poetry.
“I’m in 9th grade. I’m a freshman at East Lansing High School.” Well I knew that in order to get the idea of just how diverse and complex poetry could be the best place to start would be to read some poetry and maybe get her inspired. So we went on the computer and began looking up poems. At first, I asked her what kind of poem she might want to write about, and she answered something about writing one in French since she spoke French. So we tried searching for French poems but that didn’t work out very well. So I went ahead and started with what I knew and typed in “Shel Silverstein.” She had never read his poems before. We started to read one called “If I Were One Inch Tall.” It was clever, funny, and she really liked it.
One Inch Tall
By Shel Silverstein
If you were only one inch tall, you'd ride a worm to school.
The teardrop of a crying ant would be your swimming pool.
A crumb of cake would be a feast
And last you seven days at least,
A flea would be a frightening beast
If you were one inch tall.
If you were only one inch tall, you'd walk beneath the door,
And it would take about a month to get down to the store.
A bit of fluff would be your bed,
You'd swing upon a spider's thread,
And wear a thimble on your head
If you were one inch tall.
You'd surf across the kitchen sink upon a stick of gum.
You couldn't hug your mama, you'd just have to hug her thumb.
You'd run from people's feet in fright,
To move a pen would take all night,
(This poem took fourteen years to write--
'Cause I'm just one inch tall).
The next one that I pulled up was a longer poem, and she didn’t want to finish it because it was too long and “boring”. If she didn’t like a poem, that was her reason – “it’s boring.” So I realized that I should try to keep them interesting and short. I was trying to get her to enjoy it. My main goal was to expose poetry in a good light, so that her first experience with it would be pleasant. After a few more poems, each time asking her to explain what she liked about it and what she didn’t to help her find her own style, we moved to Maya Angelou. She had heard of her, and had read some which she really enjoyed. The one poem that she seemed to really be fond of was “Touched by an Angel.” After we had finished reading it, I asked her why she liked this one so much. “I don’t really know.” She replied. “I guess it’s just this feeling I get from it. Like she’s saying to have love with you all the time because it is just so powerful. Like how it can set you free.”
Touched by an Angel
By Maya Angelou
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.
We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
Then we moved onto the mechanics of a poem. I tried my best at expressing how free you can be with poetry and how it has rules, but doesn’t at the same time. Simile, metaphor, play on words, white space, emotions, alliteration, fragments, run-ons; there were a lot of things I was remembering and I think I bombarded her at first when I started listing them. As soon as I saw her face I stopped and simply started with simile. We looked up the definition and then read some examples that the website had provided. “A simile is a technique that uses words such as ‘like’ or ‘as’ to compare two ideas. Ex: Big as an elephant. Cold like the middle of winter” (AHD, 2002). Then we looked up metaphor. “A metaphor is a comparison of two different things stating how the one is or is not like the other. Ex: Cindy was such a mule. We couldn’t get her to change her mind. Brian was a wall, bouncing every tennis ball back over the net” (AHD, 2002). She had heard of these two terms before and understood the concepts quickly.
Finally, we got to actually writing her poem. Every poem has a purpose as well as an idea. I asked her what she was interested in. She said soccer and the cello.
“Which one do you want to write a poem about?”
“The cello” she answered.
“Great” I said. So I had her start by listing the answers to some questions I quickly came up with. “What does it look like? What is it made of? What does it sound like? What do you feel like when you listen to it?” When she finished her list I turned to her and said, “did you know this, what you have right here, could be considered a poem?” She looked at me like I was crazy. I insisted that poetry is so diverse and free that anything can really be a poem as long as it is trying to express some sort of idea or emotion using language thoughtfully and creatively. Her response was “yea, but that would be boring.” So I told her to write a poem using these ideas to help her if she wanted. I sat patiently while she wrote. After she wrote the first line, she instructed me to not look. So I turned myself around and focused on others working in the room. She tapped me on the back a few minutes later. I asked if she was done. She said no but she wanted me to read it anyway. She prefaced it by saying that it “sucked” and was “boring.” Why do we do that to ourselves? I am as guilty as the next. I’ve always done it so that I wouldn’t be disappointed if someone else thought it “sucked” too. But, from an outsider’s view, there are two major things wrong with this. One is that we are expecting someone else to say it’s bad, and two we are going to let that affect us. Well I started to read it. WOW. And I mean WOW. It was so good.
“This is sooooo good. Like really good!” I said with a lot of excitement in my voice.
“You kinda crazy.” She laughed. But it really was good. She had great repetition. This repeated phrase of forgetting the name of the cello but still being able to describe it. It just, based on what she had said about not ever writing a poem before, I just wasn’t prepared for that kind of talent. I was just really impressed.
“The greater Lansing area is home to a large population of refugees from all corners of the world. Many of these individuals have suffered grave injustices and lived in places where they had little to no control over their lives. They have lost family, friends, homes and entire communities to greed. Most refugees will receive assistance for six months. After this support expires, however, they are left in unfamiliar surroundings in a country that is still foreign to them. They often have little money, few contacts, and a limited understanding of America’s vast and complex culture. That is where the Refugee Development Center comes in. With the help of volunteers and community partners we provide refugees with the skills they need to succeed” (RDC, 2008).
The RDC is located at 122 S. Pennsylvania Ave. in an older stone building built as a church. Then in 2002 the entire third floor and many of the offices were designated solely to the RDC program with the mission to “provide the education and support refugees need to become self-sufficient members of society” (RDC, 2008). Our teacher education class at Michigan State University had been working with the RDC for the past few months now, and up until that day, my experiences hadn’t been anything “great.” Because of some rough starts, a lack of organization at first, and just a little bit of overall confusion, the program simply hadn’t been running as smoothly as we had hoped. So on that particular Thursday, I went up stairs to where I usually tutor, but there weren’t very many students there yet, or if they were there they already had someone helping them. So I waited, and a few minutes later, a girl walked in and sat down. She was shorter than me, but then again just about everyone is shorter than you when you are six foot five. I would say she was just about five feet. She had dark brown skin, dark brown eyes, and dark brown braided hair with a few dyed blonde streaks through it tied back. After a few minutes of getting settled in and then finishing up a conversation with one of her friends, she pulled out her books, sat them down on the wooden table, looked around, and saw me.
“Could you help me with my homework?” She asked.
“Sure.” I answered. I was just excited to be able to do something. I came over and sat down next to her at the table. “I’m Adam. What’s your name?”
“Teresa.”
“Nice to meet you Teresa. So what are you working on?”
“This.” She handed me a couple pieces of paper about a contest for poetry and prose/essay writing. I read through it and it sounded really neat. You could submit two poems and one essay. The winners got published in a magazine and they also got a cash award prize. I asked her which she would like to try first, the poetry or the prose. She said she needed help writing a poem. YES! I was so excited. My English class just finished our poetry unit, and I personally love poetry.
“So what do you know about poetry?” I asked her.
“Well, I know what a poem is, but I have never written one.”
“What grade are you in?” I asked because I was really surprised. She looked like she was about seventeen years old so I would be surprised if she had made it through most of high school and never was exposed to poetry.
“I’m in 9th grade. I’m a freshman at East Lansing High School.” Well I knew that in order to get the idea of just how diverse and complex poetry could be the best place to start would be to read some poetry and maybe get her inspired. So we went on the computer and began looking up poems. At first, I asked her what kind of poem she might want to write about, and she answered something about writing one in French since she spoke French. So we tried searching for French poems but that didn’t work out very well. So I went ahead and started with what I knew and typed in “Shel Silverstein.” She had never read his poems before. We started to read one called “If I Were One Inch Tall.” It was clever, funny, and she really liked it.
One Inch Tall
By Shel Silverstein
If you were only one inch tall, you'd ride a worm to school.
The teardrop of a crying ant would be your swimming pool.
A crumb of cake would be a feast
And last you seven days at least,
A flea would be a frightening beast
If you were one inch tall.
If you were only one inch tall, you'd walk beneath the door,
And it would take about a month to get down to the store.
A bit of fluff would be your bed,
You'd swing upon a spider's thread,
And wear a thimble on your head
If you were one inch tall.
You'd surf across the kitchen sink upon a stick of gum.
You couldn't hug your mama, you'd just have to hug her thumb.
You'd run from people's feet in fright,
To move a pen would take all night,
(This poem took fourteen years to write--
'Cause I'm just one inch tall).
The next one that I pulled up was a longer poem, and she didn’t want to finish it because it was too long and “boring”. If she didn’t like a poem, that was her reason – “it’s boring.” So I realized that I should try to keep them interesting and short. I was trying to get her to enjoy it. My main goal was to expose poetry in a good light, so that her first experience with it would be pleasant. After a few more poems, each time asking her to explain what she liked about it and what she didn’t to help her find her own style, we moved to Maya Angelou. She had heard of her, and had read some which she really enjoyed. The one poem that she seemed to really be fond of was “Touched by an Angel.” After we had finished reading it, I asked her why she liked this one so much. “I don’t really know.” She replied. “I guess it’s just this feeling I get from it. Like she’s saying to have love with you all the time because it is just so powerful. Like how it can set you free.”
Touched by an Angel
By Maya Angelou
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of pleasure
ancient histories of pain.
Yet if we are bold,
love strikes away the chains of fear
from our souls.
We are weaned from our timidity
In the flush of love's light
we dare be brave
And suddenly we see
that love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
Then we moved onto the mechanics of a poem. I tried my best at expressing how free you can be with poetry and how it has rules, but doesn’t at the same time. Simile, metaphor, play on words, white space, emotions, alliteration, fragments, run-ons; there were a lot of things I was remembering and I think I bombarded her at first when I started listing them. As soon as I saw her face I stopped and simply started with simile. We looked up the definition and then read some examples that the website had provided. “A simile is a technique that uses words such as ‘like’ or ‘as’ to compare two ideas. Ex: Big as an elephant. Cold like the middle of winter” (AHD, 2002). Then we looked up metaphor. “A metaphor is a comparison of two different things stating how the one is or is not like the other. Ex: Cindy was such a mule. We couldn’t get her to change her mind. Brian was a wall, bouncing every tennis ball back over the net” (AHD, 2002). She had heard of these two terms before and understood the concepts quickly.
Finally, we got to actually writing her poem. Every poem has a purpose as well as an idea. I asked her what she was interested in. She said soccer and the cello.
“Which one do you want to write a poem about?”
“The cello” she answered.
“Great” I said. So I had her start by listing the answers to some questions I quickly came up with. “What does it look like? What is it made of? What does it sound like? What do you feel like when you listen to it?” When she finished her list I turned to her and said, “did you know this, what you have right here, could be considered a poem?” She looked at me like I was crazy. I insisted that poetry is so diverse and free that anything can really be a poem as long as it is trying to express some sort of idea or emotion using language thoughtfully and creatively. Her response was “yea, but that would be boring.” So I told her to write a poem using these ideas to help her if she wanted. I sat patiently while she wrote. After she wrote the first line, she instructed me to not look. So I turned myself around and focused on others working in the room. She tapped me on the back a few minutes later. I asked if she was done. She said no but she wanted me to read it anyway. She prefaced it by saying that it “sucked” and was “boring.” Why do we do that to ourselves? I am as guilty as the next. I’ve always done it so that I wouldn’t be disappointed if someone else thought it “sucked” too. But, from an outsider’s view, there are two major things wrong with this. One is that we are expecting someone else to say it’s bad, and two we are going to let that affect us. Well I started to read it. WOW. And I mean WOW. It was so good.
“This is sooooo good. Like really good!” I said with a lot of excitement in my voice.
“You kinda crazy.” She laughed. But it really was good. She had great repetition. This repeated phrase of forgetting the name of the cello but still being able to describe it. It just, based on what she had said about not ever writing a poem before, I just wasn’t prepared for that kind of talent. I was just really impressed.
“My Childhood was Hard”
Getting to Know Teresa’s Past
Throughout the next few months, just about every Thursday I ended up working with Teresa, learning more and more about her. Teresa was fifteen years old, described her ethnicity as African, her race as Mulatto, and spoke six languages; English, French, African-English, Grobul, Tapu, Beach-Grobul. I asked her once, which language she thought she spoke best only to get the response “I think I know them all equally good.” This was a common characterization of Teresa that I was beginning to notice. She was positive. She just always had a smile on her face, in spite of everything that she had gone through. Things that most people will never have to deal with in their whole lives, she has already dealt with as a child.
“What was your childhood like?” I asked her one day. We had finished her homework so that gave us some time to just chill, so I decided to ask her a few questions about her life.
“My childhood was hard. I lived with my grandma, then I went to a different country to stay with my aunt, then I left and went to a different country to stay with my uncle, then I left again to stay with my other aunt. So I would stay everywhere. I didn’t meet my mom till I was six years old because she was in another country. But before I could meet her I went to my uncle, and his wife. She was just mean. So I had to go to my mom and that is when she registered for me to come to America.”
“You came to the United States three years ago right?” I asked. She nodded to let me know I was correct. Teresa and I had been working together for a while now, and I had come to find out that she loved to talk. She loved to talk about herself, but more so, she wanted to tell her story so that people could understand her better. So I didn’t feel that she was at all uncomfortable talking about any of this with me, so I continued with another question. “Can I ask why?”
“I came here for education and also because there was war in my country, so we came here for safety.”
The order of her statement gave me pause. She put education over her safety. And her safety was definitely at stake. Her country was at war. In an earlier conversation she told me more about that. We were talking about some of the differences between her school back in Liberia and her school here in Michigan. “You had to cut your hair short,” she started, “because you could hide something in your hair. Like, in my country there were a lot of people who were poisoning people. So you could hide poison in your hair.”
Now I have to admit, this shocked me. I am only still breaking down my cultural boundaries and a sheltered state of mind that living in a small suburban city gave me. So, my eyes unconsciously got a little bit bigger, and my mouth dropped open a little bit wider. I think she noticed because she followed up her comment by saying “But, I love my country, better than I love America.” I didn’t want her to think I was judging her or her country, but that had just caught me off guard.
“What else made it unsafe?” I asked.
“Well, like one time, because not a lot of televisions were in school, so other kids went to school on Friday or Saturday in 2000, and they announced on the radio that the people were going to attack, but no one didn’t know because everyone was like doing something or the kids were at school. Then after I came back from school, my aunt she owns a shop where you can buy groceries and stuff like that, so I was going to her and they started shooting. Yea, I didn’t know what that was back then.”
“What did you do?”
“I ran to my friend’s house because she was really close. And my aunt and us in the night had to sneak out, pack our stuff, and then go to a different location where we could be safe. And when we came back we saw, the rebels, after they killed people, they nailed their hands on the house wall. And we came back, we had to clean up our house and stuff like that because young kids, everyone, was like dead all in the streets. That was the first time I saw a dead body.”
In 2000, Teresa was seven years old. At seven, she had experienced gun fire, dead bodies, warfare, and who knows what else. “In their short years on the planet, they had lived extraordinary lives, and nobody had told them their lives were extraordinary, that they were extraordinary for having survived” (Michie, 1999, p. ix). And teachers wonder why some students just can’t seem to focus. I continued to ask some questions, but there were too many things I was feeling, I didn’t really hear her answers to them until I listened to them again on the recording device I had brought. I felt pity for her, that someone had to go through that and experience something like that. I felt proud of her, that she was able to be so strong, and was able to talk about it so calmly. I felt ashamed of earlier feeling pity. I felt confused as to how amazing she really was because she could survive, when any other person that I knew would simply just not have been able to do so.
“Looking back on those experiences how do you view them now?”
“It makes me stronger and a little scared because I feel much safer and I feel blessed because I could have been those kids back then and God saved my life because he had a plan for me. And I also feel scared because I’m afraid when I go back to my country again, that’s going to happen again, and I might not be that lucky again, because luck only comes around once.”
“How do your American peers connect with you about these experiences and feelings?”
“We watched a video; it was called ‘Sudan Boys.’ That’s when they had to walk a long journey, and the kids [her American classmates] were like “oh this is so lame” and stuff. And I felt really bad because they are saying all this stuff because they don’t know how it feels to be in a war and hope you have food, and hope you have clothing. And feel like oh, this is a dream and when I wake up I will feel all better and stuff. You’re actually living a life like that and you wonder will I ever be able to be free again and survive all these horrible things. So if they ever experience that, I think they will know what it feels like to be stuck in bad situations like that.”
She was so right. There is such a disconnect with history for American students. It might even go as far as saying there is a disconnect with history for white American students. For the most part, the history that is taught in schools is white history, presented from one point of view. For students like Teresa, a refugee, it is important to find some connections and explore those other views of both American and their own countries’ history. Not only is it important for the students, but it’s important for me as their teacher. “To begin to have a true respect for my kids, I had to get to know them not only as individuals, but also as people in a particular context: children of Mexican immigrants, living in a working-class neighborhood, on the South Side of Chicago, within an increasingly xenophobic larger society, in the 1990’s. I also had to commit myself to learning more about the historical, political, and economic developments – both in Mexico and in the U.S. – that had brought them to where they were, and the current issues that continued to affect them” (Michie, 1999, p. 85).
Only to add evidence to how powerful Teresa’s past was, I had asked her what has been the saddest moment in her life to which she replied“when the war came, because my grandfather died in the war. So that was the saddest moment for me.” Her short answer was uncommon, so I looked up from my notes to see if she was done. When I did, I noticed a little extra water beginning to cloud her eye, so I decided that we had talked about that topic long enough.
“So tell me about your family.”
“Well my,” she started. “There is my dad (Jefferson who actually had three wives, common in her country), my mom (Agatha who was her dad’s first wife), my younger sister Theriesa, and then my other brothers and sisters from my dad’s other wives Flouring, Prince and Judias.”
“So they are your half siblings,” I commented as I began to write the fraction half down on my notes.
“No.” She corrected. I looked up. “They are not my half siblings. They are still my brothers and sisters.”
“Anyone else?” I asked.
“Well I have three grandmothers, Watta, Niya, Cahw.” We spend a little time trying to decide how to spell them in English. “And well, my grandfather. I don’t remember his name because he died the day I was born. And we don’t really talk about them when they die. And my Great Grandma. She was 110 years old. We live to be really old.” She laughed.
“What was your childhood like?” I asked her one day. We had finished her homework so that gave us some time to just chill, so I decided to ask her a few questions about her life.
“My childhood was hard. I lived with my grandma, then I went to a different country to stay with my aunt, then I left and went to a different country to stay with my uncle, then I left again to stay with my other aunt. So I would stay everywhere. I didn’t meet my mom till I was six years old because she was in another country. But before I could meet her I went to my uncle, and his wife. She was just mean. So I had to go to my mom and that is when she registered for me to come to America.”
“You came to the United States three years ago right?” I asked. She nodded to let me know I was correct. Teresa and I had been working together for a while now, and I had come to find out that she loved to talk. She loved to talk about herself, but more so, she wanted to tell her story so that people could understand her better. So I didn’t feel that she was at all uncomfortable talking about any of this with me, so I continued with another question. “Can I ask why?”
“I came here for education and also because there was war in my country, so we came here for safety.”
The order of her statement gave me pause. She put education over her safety. And her safety was definitely at stake. Her country was at war. In an earlier conversation she told me more about that. We were talking about some of the differences between her school back in Liberia and her school here in Michigan. “You had to cut your hair short,” she started, “because you could hide something in your hair. Like, in my country there were a lot of people who were poisoning people. So you could hide poison in your hair.”
Now I have to admit, this shocked me. I am only still breaking down my cultural boundaries and a sheltered state of mind that living in a small suburban city gave me. So, my eyes unconsciously got a little bit bigger, and my mouth dropped open a little bit wider. I think she noticed because she followed up her comment by saying “But, I love my country, better than I love America.” I didn’t want her to think I was judging her or her country, but that had just caught me off guard.
“What else made it unsafe?” I asked.
“Well, like one time, because not a lot of televisions were in school, so other kids went to school on Friday or Saturday in 2000, and they announced on the radio that the people were going to attack, but no one didn’t know because everyone was like doing something or the kids were at school. Then after I came back from school, my aunt she owns a shop where you can buy groceries and stuff like that, so I was going to her and they started shooting. Yea, I didn’t know what that was back then.”
“What did you do?”
“I ran to my friend’s house because she was really close. And my aunt and us in the night had to sneak out, pack our stuff, and then go to a different location where we could be safe. And when we came back we saw, the rebels, after they killed people, they nailed their hands on the house wall. And we came back, we had to clean up our house and stuff like that because young kids, everyone, was like dead all in the streets. That was the first time I saw a dead body.”
In 2000, Teresa was seven years old. At seven, she had experienced gun fire, dead bodies, warfare, and who knows what else. “In their short years on the planet, they had lived extraordinary lives, and nobody had told them their lives were extraordinary, that they were extraordinary for having survived” (Michie, 1999, p. ix). And teachers wonder why some students just can’t seem to focus. I continued to ask some questions, but there were too many things I was feeling, I didn’t really hear her answers to them until I listened to them again on the recording device I had brought. I felt pity for her, that someone had to go through that and experience something like that. I felt proud of her, that she was able to be so strong, and was able to talk about it so calmly. I felt ashamed of earlier feeling pity. I felt confused as to how amazing she really was because she could survive, when any other person that I knew would simply just not have been able to do so.
“Looking back on those experiences how do you view them now?”
“It makes me stronger and a little scared because I feel much safer and I feel blessed because I could have been those kids back then and God saved my life because he had a plan for me. And I also feel scared because I’m afraid when I go back to my country again, that’s going to happen again, and I might not be that lucky again, because luck only comes around once.”
“How do your American peers connect with you about these experiences and feelings?”
“We watched a video; it was called ‘Sudan Boys.’ That’s when they had to walk a long journey, and the kids [her American classmates] were like “oh this is so lame” and stuff. And I felt really bad because they are saying all this stuff because they don’t know how it feels to be in a war and hope you have food, and hope you have clothing. And feel like oh, this is a dream and when I wake up I will feel all better and stuff. You’re actually living a life like that and you wonder will I ever be able to be free again and survive all these horrible things. So if they ever experience that, I think they will know what it feels like to be stuck in bad situations like that.”
She was so right. There is such a disconnect with history for American students. It might even go as far as saying there is a disconnect with history for white American students. For the most part, the history that is taught in schools is white history, presented from one point of view. For students like Teresa, a refugee, it is important to find some connections and explore those other views of both American and their own countries’ history. Not only is it important for the students, but it’s important for me as their teacher. “To begin to have a true respect for my kids, I had to get to know them not only as individuals, but also as people in a particular context: children of Mexican immigrants, living in a working-class neighborhood, on the South Side of Chicago, within an increasingly xenophobic larger society, in the 1990’s. I also had to commit myself to learning more about the historical, political, and economic developments – both in Mexico and in the U.S. – that had brought them to where they were, and the current issues that continued to affect them” (Michie, 1999, p. 85).
Only to add evidence to how powerful Teresa’s past was, I had asked her what has been the saddest moment in her life to which she replied“when the war came, because my grandfather died in the war. So that was the saddest moment for me.” Her short answer was uncommon, so I looked up from my notes to see if she was done. When I did, I noticed a little extra water beginning to cloud her eye, so I decided that we had talked about that topic long enough.
“So tell me about your family.”
“Well my,” she started. “There is my dad (Jefferson who actually had three wives, common in her country), my mom (Agatha who was her dad’s first wife), my younger sister Theriesa, and then my other brothers and sisters from my dad’s other wives Flouring, Prince and Judias.”
“So they are your half siblings,” I commented as I began to write the fraction half down on my notes.
“No.” She corrected. I looked up. “They are not my half siblings. They are still my brothers and sisters.”
“Anyone else?” I asked.
“Well I have three grandmothers, Watta, Niya, Cahw.” We spend a little time trying to decide how to spell them in English. “And well, my grandfather. I don’t remember his name because he died the day I was born. And we don’t really talk about them when they die. And my Great Grandma. She was 110 years old. We live to be really old.” She laughed.
“Coming to America Was the Hardest Thing of My Life”
Teresa’s Transition to America
Teresa Kippler. Well that’s the name she chose three years ago anyway. When she was born on August 16th 1993, her mother named her Juié á Yeaínah. Shakespeare may have rhetorically asked “what’s in a name” only to state that a name holds no meaning, it is the person behind it that matters. However, to Teresa, and probably many other refugees, there is a lot in a name.
While tutoring at the RDC, there are many nationalities that come through the door. And with many nationalities come different cultures, and with different cultures come different names; Loui, Asia, Jeanine, Bintu, Janeba, Momundu, Teresa, Issac, Mailos, Esperance, Emmanuel, Roy, Eugena, Esta, Aveen, Phillip, Oricie. Some are the names their parents gave them when they were born, and others, like Teresa, are names they gave themselves when they came to America. Many times when working with these students, when they introduced themselves they would say “I’m Juié á but just call me Teresa.” It depends on the student, but for the most part, when we were there we tried our best to call them by their name – their real name. The worry is that “how gradually embracing an “American” identity might lead them to deny another part of themselves” (Michie, 1999, p. 83).
When Teresa talked about her past she distinctly separated it into two different parts; her first thirteen years in Africa and the last three in Michigan. The event of moving from Africa to the United States was probably the biggest change in her life thus far. I mean, she did move across continents, so that would make sense. Thus, to her it was the dividing point between the old and the new, an event she views both positively and negatively.
“What has been the happiest moment in your life?”
“Coming to America.” She said after a short moment of silent thinking. “It was a new experience for me. A new life. A new everything. And a better opportunity to get a good education and stuff like that.”
“But a moment ago you described that moment as a living hell,” I said out loud recalling one of her earlier comments of how she ‘heard a lot of rumors about how America is like a second heaven, but when [she] came here it’s like a second hell.’ She laughed and then tried to explain it to me.
“It was happy and not happy because it’s like really hard to see all the people you know like all your family like everything you were, and just leave that behind and don’t know when you are going to come back, and when I go back I can’t see my grandma because she died and I don’t even remember what she looks like. And that’s really hard. It really hurts.”
For Teresa, coming to the U.S. meant starting over which she described as something both good and bad. She further explained it by saying “my childhood started again. Like you know when you are five years old you are trying to meet other kids, even though I was twelve.” She had to leave everything she ‘was.’ As much as America claims to be a melting pot, it seems that it expects more “Americanization” than anything from immigrants.
“So what was your first year in America like?”
“My first year here was rough. Because most the kids were racist. The first day I went to school, there was a boy and he threatened my little sister with a knife. And the school was wild, the teachers didn’t even care. I just wanted to go back to my country. I feel like this is not what I expected, and this is a place I don’t want to be. No one here is like me, they are not from my country, they don’t even know what I have gone through, they don’t speak my language, and they don’t even try to understand or ask for my name. They just pointed at me when they were talking about me and I know they were talking about me.”
No one has ever said that life was easy, but it is undeniably true that a person should never have to feel the way that Teresa felt, especially when they are describing their feelings about coming to America. People come to America to seek refuge, but many times it’s plausible that they need to seek refuge from America some days. Unfair treatment, discrimination, and language barriers are all things that Teresa has faced and worse yet is that many of them took place right in the educational system. America, which is a nation of immigrants who apparently have forgotten where they really come from and the real struggles that they or their ancestors faced, has turned its back on these issues. How quickly we seem to forget. Yet, it is not just us, by which I mean to refer to those whose ancestors immigrated here many generations ago now, that have seemed to have forgotten. Even Teresa let me know her feelings on “outside” people coming in to America.
“What is the biggest problem in the United States?” I asked her.
“Americans accept too many people from different countries here. That might affect them in the future later on. They might just be doing it to keep their population high, that way they can get power later on. I don’t know. Like if I was the president I don’t think I would let that happen.”
“You think this way even though you yourself were accepted to come to America?”
“I know. I am confused with that. Because if I was the president of Liberia, I wouldn’t just let anyone come in the country. I would make sure they have their green card or an important reason for coming into my country. Because they could start a war, and I don’t want them to wreck everything I had done to keep it together.” I found this really quite interesting. She had only been in America for three years now, but already felt that they let too many people in. Her reasons made sense, and I don’t believe she was saying that no one should be allowed to come, I just thought it was interesting how after only a short amount of time, she seemed a little distant to those “people from different countries.”
In talking with Teresa, the biggest change, aside from moving to a completely new world, was that in order to survive they had to adjust to a new way of life. She had told me that she missed her family, the holidays, the celebrations, and the traditions of things they did together. When asked if she still celebrated the holidays with her family, she responded “not really because they work a lot and so when those days come, like when Christmas comes, we call them and if they are not there we leave a message. But this year we will hopefully go to visit my grandma in Georgia. My other grandma who is in Liberia, she just passed away, so we couldn’t go visit her because it’s like $8,000 to go back over there and come back.” For Teresa, family is a large term which includes her whole family; grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, cousins. “In Africa,” she started, “when you turn eighteen you don’t have to leave. We had like twenty families in the same house. We were a large family. Some of them I didn’t really even know. There were so many.” Yet despite the fact that she didn’t get to see them and that she felt that her culture was slowly slipping away, they have been able to hold on to some of it. “We have a family game night. We play Lulu – It’s an African game.”
But things have improved for Teresa since that first day at school. Their family moved to East Lansing where she was able to meet some friends. “So, when lunch came, I didn’t want to eat, because I didn’t know anyone. But this girl came over and said ‘hi’ and I said ‘hi.’ Then she asked ‘are you Jamaican because you are talking like one.’ And I didn’t know what to say? So I was like ‘huh?’ And my teacher told her I was from Ivory Coast, Liberia. So she was like ‘I love that country. Can you show it to me on the map?’ So I showed her and she was like ‘that is so cool.’ So she asked some silly questions, but I asked some silly ones too, because we just didn’t know about anything.”
She laughed for a little bit continuing with some other funny conversations between her and her new friend. But then she paused for a second, like she was watching a memory play over in her head. Then she turned back to me with a very straight face and said “coming to America was the hardest thing of my life.”
While tutoring at the RDC, there are many nationalities that come through the door. And with many nationalities come different cultures, and with different cultures come different names; Loui, Asia, Jeanine, Bintu, Janeba, Momundu, Teresa, Issac, Mailos, Esperance, Emmanuel, Roy, Eugena, Esta, Aveen, Phillip, Oricie. Some are the names their parents gave them when they were born, and others, like Teresa, are names they gave themselves when they came to America. Many times when working with these students, when they introduced themselves they would say “I’m Juié á but just call me Teresa.” It depends on the student, but for the most part, when we were there we tried our best to call them by their name – their real name. The worry is that “how gradually embracing an “American” identity might lead them to deny another part of themselves” (Michie, 1999, p. 83).
When Teresa talked about her past she distinctly separated it into two different parts; her first thirteen years in Africa and the last three in Michigan. The event of moving from Africa to the United States was probably the biggest change in her life thus far. I mean, she did move across continents, so that would make sense. Thus, to her it was the dividing point between the old and the new, an event she views both positively and negatively.
“What has been the happiest moment in your life?”
“Coming to America.” She said after a short moment of silent thinking. “It was a new experience for me. A new life. A new everything. And a better opportunity to get a good education and stuff like that.”
“But a moment ago you described that moment as a living hell,” I said out loud recalling one of her earlier comments of how she ‘heard a lot of rumors about how America is like a second heaven, but when [she] came here it’s like a second hell.’ She laughed and then tried to explain it to me.
“It was happy and not happy because it’s like really hard to see all the people you know like all your family like everything you were, and just leave that behind and don’t know when you are going to come back, and when I go back I can’t see my grandma because she died and I don’t even remember what she looks like. And that’s really hard. It really hurts.”
For Teresa, coming to the U.S. meant starting over which she described as something both good and bad. She further explained it by saying “my childhood started again. Like you know when you are five years old you are trying to meet other kids, even though I was twelve.” She had to leave everything she ‘was.’ As much as America claims to be a melting pot, it seems that it expects more “Americanization” than anything from immigrants.
“So what was your first year in America like?”
“My first year here was rough. Because most the kids were racist. The first day I went to school, there was a boy and he threatened my little sister with a knife. And the school was wild, the teachers didn’t even care. I just wanted to go back to my country. I feel like this is not what I expected, and this is a place I don’t want to be. No one here is like me, they are not from my country, they don’t even know what I have gone through, they don’t speak my language, and they don’t even try to understand or ask for my name. They just pointed at me when they were talking about me and I know they were talking about me.”
No one has ever said that life was easy, but it is undeniably true that a person should never have to feel the way that Teresa felt, especially when they are describing their feelings about coming to America. People come to America to seek refuge, but many times it’s plausible that they need to seek refuge from America some days. Unfair treatment, discrimination, and language barriers are all things that Teresa has faced and worse yet is that many of them took place right in the educational system. America, which is a nation of immigrants who apparently have forgotten where they really come from and the real struggles that they or their ancestors faced, has turned its back on these issues. How quickly we seem to forget. Yet, it is not just us, by which I mean to refer to those whose ancestors immigrated here many generations ago now, that have seemed to have forgotten. Even Teresa let me know her feelings on “outside” people coming in to America.
“What is the biggest problem in the United States?” I asked her.
“Americans accept too many people from different countries here. That might affect them in the future later on. They might just be doing it to keep their population high, that way they can get power later on. I don’t know. Like if I was the president I don’t think I would let that happen.”
“You think this way even though you yourself were accepted to come to America?”
“I know. I am confused with that. Because if I was the president of Liberia, I wouldn’t just let anyone come in the country. I would make sure they have their green card or an important reason for coming into my country. Because they could start a war, and I don’t want them to wreck everything I had done to keep it together.” I found this really quite interesting. She had only been in America for three years now, but already felt that they let too many people in. Her reasons made sense, and I don’t believe she was saying that no one should be allowed to come, I just thought it was interesting how after only a short amount of time, she seemed a little distant to those “people from different countries.”
In talking with Teresa, the biggest change, aside from moving to a completely new world, was that in order to survive they had to adjust to a new way of life. She had told me that she missed her family, the holidays, the celebrations, and the traditions of things they did together. When asked if she still celebrated the holidays with her family, she responded “not really because they work a lot and so when those days come, like when Christmas comes, we call them and if they are not there we leave a message. But this year we will hopefully go to visit my grandma in Georgia. My other grandma who is in Liberia, she just passed away, so we couldn’t go visit her because it’s like $8,000 to go back over there and come back.” For Teresa, family is a large term which includes her whole family; grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, cousins. “In Africa,” she started, “when you turn eighteen you don’t have to leave. We had like twenty families in the same house. We were a large family. Some of them I didn’t really even know. There were so many.” Yet despite the fact that she didn’t get to see them and that she felt that her culture was slowly slipping away, they have been able to hold on to some of it. “We have a family game night. We play Lulu – It’s an African game.”
But things have improved for Teresa since that first day at school. Their family moved to East Lansing where she was able to meet some friends. “So, when lunch came, I didn’t want to eat, because I didn’t know anyone. But this girl came over and said ‘hi’ and I said ‘hi.’ Then she asked ‘are you Jamaican because you are talking like one.’ And I didn’t know what to say? So I was like ‘huh?’ And my teacher told her I was from Ivory Coast, Liberia. So she was like ‘I love that country. Can you show it to me on the map?’ So I showed her and she was like ‘that is so cool.’ So she asked some silly questions, but I asked some silly ones too, because we just didn’t know about anything.”
She laughed for a little bit continuing with some other funny conversations between her and her new friend. But then she paused for a second, like she was watching a memory play over in her head. Then she turned back to me with a very straight face and said “coming to America was the hardest thing of my life.”
“I Know, I Got To Do It Because It Will Help Me”
Exploring Teresa’s Views on School
Exploring Teresa’s Views on School
Teresa attends East Lansing High School (ELHS). As a Public school offering grades 9th – 12th they enroll over 1130 students, where fifty-two percent are male and forty-eight percent are female. With sixty-two classroom teachers they match the Michigan average for teacher to student ratio of one to eighteen. With a larger range of racial makeup than most schools, ELHS is sixty-six percent white, seventeen percent black, ten percent Asian, six percent Hispanic, and one percent American Indian. Nineteen percent of the students are at or below the poverty level as determined by how many qualify for free or reduced lunch. Also they were recently awarded theSilver Medal as one of the top three percent of high schools in the country. (ELHS, 2008).
The walls of the main study room of the RDC are a mix between orange and terracotta, which made for a bright and exciting environment. There were wood blinds on the windows, and two large plastic green ferns hanging from the wall to bring “natural” life to the room – cliché but they served their purpose well. Running along all the walls are new computers each one labeled with a different country and the desktop background displays a corresponding image. Three large rectangular tables were pushed together in the middle to make a large work surface for many students to use at once. I walked up the stairs into the room and it was crowded. All the chairs were filled, so people were sitting on the floor. I found Teresa sitting at one of the computers.
“Need any help?” I asked.
“Sure. I’m doing my math homework.”
“Ok.” I looked around but didn’t see a math book anywhere. “Where is your book?”
“Oh, it’s on the computer. That way I don’t have to worry about bringing it home.” Well that’s kind of neat. In this new world of technology, there are so many new resources that can really benefit teachers and students. Still, the main word in that previous sentence was “can.” Teresa was able to do her math homework because she had access to a computer. I asked her about kids that didn’t and she said that this was just an option, that the school still provided them with text books. Yet I still wondered what kind of an advantage that gave those certain students who could use the computer.
She went ahead and typed in the password, opened it to the right page and we started her homework. It was basic solving variables in simple equations. Overall, it was a really good time. She did really well, and I was simply there to catch her if she made a mistake or clear up her confusion about a few different problems. One thing that struck me during our conversation, was a comment she made when we were about half way done. By now she knew what she was doing and if she made a mistake it was a simple one – one not made because she didn’t know the material. Anyway, she was kind of getting bored with it, and she stopped, sighed, and then said “This is so boring.” I was about to give her some encouragement, but before I could even open my mouth she said, “But I know, I got to do it because it will help me.” Teresa has a strong grasp of the power of education and believes in it a lot. But she is also very aware of the forces out there that are working against her and her large aspirations.
“Do you want to go to college?” I asked her out of the blue one day.
“I definitely do.”
“Where?”
“I want to go to Harvard or Yale.”
“Why is that?”
“Because, well it’s not only that my mom asked me to go to college because she didn’t finish college, but I’m going to college because I know it’s the best thing for me, and if I want to get a higher standard of living I need to go to college because if you go to college here and you get all your degrees, if you go back to my country, then maybe you can become a president or run for office in the government.”
If anyone thought that “The American Dream” was dying out, Teresa is proof that many still believe in it. The idea that hard work will equal success was an idea that she specifically told me she believed in. When I asked her “Do you feel that if you work hard you will be able to succeed?” She looked over at me and gave the simple but confident answer of “yes.” So this got me thinking. Where do other people learn about “The American Dream?” Do their own countries tell them that America is the land of opportunity? She had said earlier that she heard what she called “rumors” that America was a “second heaven.” Rumors that seemed to fail to include statistics like “African American children are three times as likely to drop out of school as white children are and twice as likely to be suspended from school” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 2). But a rumored “second heaven” wasn’t quite the same as “The American Dream” concept.
“So where did you learn that?”
“Learn what?” she asked. She had moved on back to her homework. The space in between her last answer and my question was apparently longer than I had realized.
“Where did you learn that if you go to school you can be successful?”
“America. They say that all the time in class. Like, I go to school every day, every morning, every stinking hour because I know there is something, something in my future that I want to do that I know it requires a lot of study a lot of school time. I have never skipped school before. And I know I will need straight A’s, and a college degree, and better everything in school. Because just now I said I wanted to go to Harvard, and I may not look like the person who is going to be able to do that, but I know I can do it if I really put my mind to it. And like if you are a better student in school you have all A’s and stuff you can get the best job ever, yea because you can get a degree and be a doctor or whatever and you don’t have to suffer like those other kids in school who weren’t paying attention in school. It’s like your reward.”
So it’s us, the American education system that instills this “bootstrap” ideology. We are teaching that this is America, a country where the idea of “The American Dream,” is held so close; “the supposed land of equal opportunity where if you just work hard enough, you can get ahead, pull yourself up by your bootstraps.” But remember, “some were born with silver shoe horns,” (Langston, 2000, p. 397) meaning that not everyone is on an equal playing field to achieve social mobility, “being able to move up socially based on the idea of meritocracy, where individuals can achieve what they want based on their individual merits,” (Labaree, 1989). “Back in my country,” Teresa told me once, “you can skip school, but I wasn’t learning. When I was mad or didn’t feel good, I just didn’t go. My parents didn’t tell me to go, but here in America, you have to go to get a job so that you are not homeless. I’m scared to be homeless.”
Along with Teresa’s strong belief in the correlation between working hard to do well in school to be successful, she still sincerely enjoyed school.
“What do you like about school?”
“I like the different subjects and getting to do different activities. And you learn something new every, every, everyday.”
“And what don’t you like about school?”
“Waking up early in the morning. Oh my gosh! And you know how like when you go to your counter you say I’m here to buy my lunch. And she is just mean. That lunch lady always bugs me.” If waking up early and lunch ladies were her only complaints about school, she sounded like every other American teenager in school.
“What makes a good teacher?” I asked later, trying to learn more about her views of school.
“A good teacher is someone who understands their students. They know their student’s problems and needs. They don’t just ask a question, but they give problems and help you and explain them and give examples. They are active and fun to be around. They tell jokes and share common experiences. Like, they are interested in your culture and who you are as a person. Like Mr. Foster, I would arm wrestle him, but I always lost. He gave me attention and said I should come back in a few years and try again. So he would still talk to me even when he wasn’t my teacher anymore. I liked that. But like that’s the biggest difference between schools here in America and my schools back in Liberia. The teachers here don’t understand people’s problems. They are not there to understand your problems. They are they just to teach you, and that’s it. So if someone made you mad and you try to explain it to the teacher they wouldn’t understand it like how you are feeling because they already went though that and say ‘oh she’ll get over it.’ And it really hurts when someone doesn’t understand you and you are trying to tell them and they are not getting it. They just worry about getting you prepared for this class and getting their money. But back in Liberia they would talk to my parents and ask ‘what is going on with your daughter.’ Here they only talk to your parents about your grades, and that’s it. They wouldn’t be like ‘oh, something was happening with your daughter today. Is she ok?’ They are just like ‘I have my own life to worry about; I can’t be worrying about someone else’s kids.’ And that is just sad.” She hadn’t even taken any Teacher Education classes, and already she knew more about education than probably most education undergraduates that know.
Her ideas of what, to her personally, made a good teacher seem like common sense. As do responses from other students in urban areas. “She listens to us! She respects us! She lets us express our opinions!” She looks us in the eye when she talks to us! She smiles at us! She speaks to us when she sees us in the hall or it the cafeteria!” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 68). Yet, these are less common in the classroom than one might think.
"So then what makes a bad teacher?” I continued.
“A bad teacher is like Mrs. Bingle. She loved to play Bingo, and it was really annoying. I think she just slept all day, because she always came in late. She also yelled at me. When I came here [to America] my first year, I didn’t speak very good English. And I think that frustrated her. Like this one time, she wanted me to take the MEAP. But they said that I didn’t have to, so I told her that. But she just yelled at me and made me take it. I couldn’t read any of it. That was not a good day,” she said with a laugh. “Also, sometimes the teachers don’t give me the same assignment as other students. Like they give you easier things to do. And sometimes, you can tell them that it is too easy, and they will give you something harder, but other times they don’t believe that you can do it unless you do it. That’s annoying.”
What “easier things to do” sounded like to me was her teachers practicing “‘false generosity,’ [which] constrains the fearful and subdued, the “rejects of life” to extend their trembling hands” (Freire, 1993). The root of “false generosity” comes from a person’s ideas and need to help others who are of a lesser social group, like refugees. There are two groups of people in the world, “oppressors” who oppress, govern, or repress the “oppressed,” those who are in lower subordinated groups, or in the minority (Freire, 1993). Thus, their relationship is one where the oppressors implement “social forces that then ‘press’ upon people and hold them down, to hem them in and block their pursuit of a good life.” It works as a balancing act. To have a group that is “privileged, one or more other categories are oppressed in relation to it” (Johnson, 2001). Going back to Teresa’s teachers, they probably believed themselves to be helping by giving her easier homework so that she doesn’t have to struggle with it. The result is that Teresa doesn’t learn the information, and will still be relying on her teachers. This act, even though it is probably unintentional, is one that keeps the oppressed relying or depending on the oppressor, thus maintaining the inequalities facing the oppressed (Freire, 1993).
“So, if you were the teacher, how would you run your class?”
“I would run my class smoothly. Everything would be in order. I hate messiness. I like neat. So all my kids, like my teachers sometimes if a kid comes to a test without a pencil, then you will fail that test. So if I am a teacher, I wouldn’t do that. I would have a pencil, paper, everything ready for my students. But when they leave the class they have to leave it with me because I can’t keep giving it to them every day. If I was the teacher I would try to make the lesson easier and understandable for kids that aren’t interested in the topic. And I mean, if a kid is not into it, there is something wrong and I would wait till after class to talk to them and ask them ‘is there something I’m doing that I am not helping you, or are you just not getting this because I’m doing something wrong, or do you just not likes this class and want to switch to another class’ and stuff like that.”
The walls of the main study room of the RDC are a mix between orange and terracotta, which made for a bright and exciting environment. There were wood blinds on the windows, and two large plastic green ferns hanging from the wall to bring “natural” life to the room – cliché but they served their purpose well. Running along all the walls are new computers each one labeled with a different country and the desktop background displays a corresponding image. Three large rectangular tables were pushed together in the middle to make a large work surface for many students to use at once. I walked up the stairs into the room and it was crowded. All the chairs were filled, so people were sitting on the floor. I found Teresa sitting at one of the computers.
“Need any help?” I asked.
“Sure. I’m doing my math homework.”
“Ok.” I looked around but didn’t see a math book anywhere. “Where is your book?”
“Oh, it’s on the computer. That way I don’t have to worry about bringing it home.” Well that’s kind of neat. In this new world of technology, there are so many new resources that can really benefit teachers and students. Still, the main word in that previous sentence was “can.” Teresa was able to do her math homework because she had access to a computer. I asked her about kids that didn’t and she said that this was just an option, that the school still provided them with text books. Yet I still wondered what kind of an advantage that gave those certain students who could use the computer.
She went ahead and typed in the password, opened it to the right page and we started her homework. It was basic solving variables in simple equations. Overall, it was a really good time. She did really well, and I was simply there to catch her if she made a mistake or clear up her confusion about a few different problems. One thing that struck me during our conversation, was a comment she made when we were about half way done. By now she knew what she was doing and if she made a mistake it was a simple one – one not made because she didn’t know the material. Anyway, she was kind of getting bored with it, and she stopped, sighed, and then said “This is so boring.” I was about to give her some encouragement, but before I could even open my mouth she said, “But I know, I got to do it because it will help me.” Teresa has a strong grasp of the power of education and believes in it a lot. But she is also very aware of the forces out there that are working against her and her large aspirations.
“Do you want to go to college?” I asked her out of the blue one day.
“I definitely do.”
“Where?”
“I want to go to Harvard or Yale.”
“Why is that?”
“Because, well it’s not only that my mom asked me to go to college because she didn’t finish college, but I’m going to college because I know it’s the best thing for me, and if I want to get a higher standard of living I need to go to college because if you go to college here and you get all your degrees, if you go back to my country, then maybe you can become a president or run for office in the government.”
If anyone thought that “The American Dream” was dying out, Teresa is proof that many still believe in it. The idea that hard work will equal success was an idea that she specifically told me she believed in. When I asked her “Do you feel that if you work hard you will be able to succeed?” She looked over at me and gave the simple but confident answer of “yes.” So this got me thinking. Where do other people learn about “The American Dream?” Do their own countries tell them that America is the land of opportunity? She had said earlier that she heard what she called “rumors” that America was a “second heaven.” Rumors that seemed to fail to include statistics like “African American children are three times as likely to drop out of school as white children are and twice as likely to be suspended from school” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 2). But a rumored “second heaven” wasn’t quite the same as “The American Dream” concept.
“So where did you learn that?”
“Learn what?” she asked. She had moved on back to her homework. The space in between her last answer and my question was apparently longer than I had realized.
“Where did you learn that if you go to school you can be successful?”
“America. They say that all the time in class. Like, I go to school every day, every morning, every stinking hour because I know there is something, something in my future that I want to do that I know it requires a lot of study a lot of school time. I have never skipped school before. And I know I will need straight A’s, and a college degree, and better everything in school. Because just now I said I wanted to go to Harvard, and I may not look like the person who is going to be able to do that, but I know I can do it if I really put my mind to it. And like if you are a better student in school you have all A’s and stuff you can get the best job ever, yea because you can get a degree and be a doctor or whatever and you don’t have to suffer like those other kids in school who weren’t paying attention in school. It’s like your reward.”
So it’s us, the American education system that instills this “bootstrap” ideology. We are teaching that this is America, a country where the idea of “The American Dream,” is held so close; “the supposed land of equal opportunity where if you just work hard enough, you can get ahead, pull yourself up by your bootstraps.” But remember, “some were born with silver shoe horns,” (Langston, 2000, p. 397) meaning that not everyone is on an equal playing field to achieve social mobility, “being able to move up socially based on the idea of meritocracy, where individuals can achieve what they want based on their individual merits,” (Labaree, 1989). “Back in my country,” Teresa told me once, “you can skip school, but I wasn’t learning. When I was mad or didn’t feel good, I just didn’t go. My parents didn’t tell me to go, but here in America, you have to go to get a job so that you are not homeless. I’m scared to be homeless.”
Along with Teresa’s strong belief in the correlation between working hard to do well in school to be successful, she still sincerely enjoyed school.
“What do you like about school?”
“I like the different subjects and getting to do different activities. And you learn something new every, every, everyday.”
“And what don’t you like about school?”
“Waking up early in the morning. Oh my gosh! And you know how like when you go to your counter you say I’m here to buy my lunch. And she is just mean. That lunch lady always bugs me.” If waking up early and lunch ladies were her only complaints about school, she sounded like every other American teenager in school.
“What makes a good teacher?” I asked later, trying to learn more about her views of school.
“A good teacher is someone who understands their students. They know their student’s problems and needs. They don’t just ask a question, but they give problems and help you and explain them and give examples. They are active and fun to be around. They tell jokes and share common experiences. Like, they are interested in your culture and who you are as a person. Like Mr. Foster, I would arm wrestle him, but I always lost. He gave me attention and said I should come back in a few years and try again. So he would still talk to me even when he wasn’t my teacher anymore. I liked that. But like that’s the biggest difference between schools here in America and my schools back in Liberia. The teachers here don’t understand people’s problems. They are not there to understand your problems. They are they just to teach you, and that’s it. So if someone made you mad and you try to explain it to the teacher they wouldn’t understand it like how you are feeling because they already went though that and say ‘oh she’ll get over it.’ And it really hurts when someone doesn’t understand you and you are trying to tell them and they are not getting it. They just worry about getting you prepared for this class and getting their money. But back in Liberia they would talk to my parents and ask ‘what is going on with your daughter.’ Here they only talk to your parents about your grades, and that’s it. They wouldn’t be like ‘oh, something was happening with your daughter today. Is she ok?’ They are just like ‘I have my own life to worry about; I can’t be worrying about someone else’s kids.’ And that is just sad.” She hadn’t even taken any Teacher Education classes, and already she knew more about education than probably most education undergraduates that know.
Her ideas of what, to her personally, made a good teacher seem like common sense. As do responses from other students in urban areas. “She listens to us! She respects us! She lets us express our opinions!” She looks us in the eye when she talks to us! She smiles at us! She speaks to us when she sees us in the hall or it the cafeteria!” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 68). Yet, these are less common in the classroom than one might think.
"So then what makes a bad teacher?” I continued.
“A bad teacher is like Mrs. Bingle. She loved to play Bingo, and it was really annoying. I think she just slept all day, because she always came in late. She also yelled at me. When I came here [to America] my first year, I didn’t speak very good English. And I think that frustrated her. Like this one time, she wanted me to take the MEAP. But they said that I didn’t have to, so I told her that. But she just yelled at me and made me take it. I couldn’t read any of it. That was not a good day,” she said with a laugh. “Also, sometimes the teachers don’t give me the same assignment as other students. Like they give you easier things to do. And sometimes, you can tell them that it is too easy, and they will give you something harder, but other times they don’t believe that you can do it unless you do it. That’s annoying.”
What “easier things to do” sounded like to me was her teachers practicing “‘false generosity,’ [which] constrains the fearful and subdued, the “rejects of life” to extend their trembling hands” (Freire, 1993). The root of “false generosity” comes from a person’s ideas and need to help others who are of a lesser social group, like refugees. There are two groups of people in the world, “oppressors” who oppress, govern, or repress the “oppressed,” those who are in lower subordinated groups, or in the minority (Freire, 1993). Thus, their relationship is one where the oppressors implement “social forces that then ‘press’ upon people and hold them down, to hem them in and block their pursuit of a good life.” It works as a balancing act. To have a group that is “privileged, one or more other categories are oppressed in relation to it” (Johnson, 2001). Going back to Teresa’s teachers, they probably believed themselves to be helping by giving her easier homework so that she doesn’t have to struggle with it. The result is that Teresa doesn’t learn the information, and will still be relying on her teachers. This act, even though it is probably unintentional, is one that keeps the oppressed relying or depending on the oppressor, thus maintaining the inequalities facing the oppressed (Freire, 1993).
“So, if you were the teacher, how would you run your class?”
“I would run my class smoothly. Everything would be in order. I hate messiness. I like neat. So all my kids, like my teachers sometimes if a kid comes to a test without a pencil, then you will fail that test. So if I am a teacher, I wouldn’t do that. I would have a pencil, paper, everything ready for my students. But when they leave the class they have to leave it with me because I can’t keep giving it to them every day. If I was the teacher I would try to make the lesson easier and understandable for kids that aren’t interested in the topic. And I mean, if a kid is not into it, there is something wrong and I would wait till after class to talk to them and ask them ‘is there something I’m doing that I am not helping you, or are you just not getting this because I’m doing something wrong, or do you just not likes this class and want to switch to another class’ and stuff like that.”
“I Was Always Good At Math”
Teresa’s Academic Strengths
Outside, the first snow of the year was just beginning to fall. The white flakes were small as they floated down to the ground making a thin sheet of white that covered every surface. Inside, the RDC was busy. Teresa came in, her hair a little covered in the cold white flakes. We got caught up on our last week, and she said that hers was pretty good. She had just finished reading “The Diary of Ann Frank” and had a homework project on it. We talked about the book a little. It had been a while since I had read it so I let her do most of the talking. She said she really liked it but that it was “so sad, but that I could relate to Ann in a lot of different ways, even though we are very different.” I thought that this showed a high level of mature reasoning skills on Teresa’s part. Although, this was nothing new. One of Teresa’s greatest skills was making connections between the information she was being presented and herself.
While I only worked with Teresa for a total of just a few days within that first semester, I found her to really excel at language arts. Just working with her on that first day doing poetry, not only was she was able to grasp the concepts quickly, but also so comprehensively. While her English skills were not the best I had ever heard, and her grammar both in her writings and speech were still a little rough around the edges, her thoughts were above and beyond the norm. And she had no problems expressing these thoughts, which when it comes down to it, is what the main purpose of language arts is – expressing your ideas, emotions, and thoughts through language.
“What are you good at?” I asked one day.
“Does language count?” she said with a laugh. “I am good at learning languages.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I took it from my mom. She learns languages like that,” she exclaimed as she gave a snap with her fingers. “You know how American people, I’m not being racist or anything, but they say that old people don’t learn quickly. Well for my country, that’s wrong, because the oldest people learn like that,” again saying while giving her fingers a snap. “Like English was really hard for my mom, but then she started coming here and she started speaking it. It was kind of the same for me.” It may be worth mentioning again that Teresa speaks six languages; English, French, African-English, Grobul, Tapu, Beach-Grobul. For many mastering a second language is complex and difficult let alone a sixth. Knowing another language gives a person so many benefits. It opens the door to other cultures and helps them understand and appreciate people from other countries. It helps them in achieving a global lens or view of the world, and probably most beneficial is that it gives the person new ways of being able to express themselves as different words in different languages have different meanings.
And directly opposite on the scholastic spectrum from English is Math, which Teresa and I also feel she is very strong in. “Math is the same in any language. So I was always good at math and liked it the best,” she said. For Teresa, someone who has moved around frequently, traveled across national boundaries into worlds with new languages, the one thing that remained constant for her was math. This also seemed to be true for other refugees at the RDC as well. None of them ever really needed help with math because it was the same in any country, so they never had to re-learn the language of it. This was part of the reason Teresa felt it was her best subject.
“The subject I feel I’m best at would be math, because math is like, you can’t translate math, it’s not like languages, it’s just numbers and if you’re like from any country and you know how to do math like subtracting and stuff like that, or dividing or common denominators, if you know that in a country and you move to a different country you can still do that because math is not like languages, everyone understands it.”
While I only worked with Teresa for a total of just a few days within that first semester, I found her to really excel at language arts. Just working with her on that first day doing poetry, not only was she was able to grasp the concepts quickly, but also so comprehensively. While her English skills were not the best I had ever heard, and her grammar both in her writings and speech were still a little rough around the edges, her thoughts were above and beyond the norm. And she had no problems expressing these thoughts, which when it comes down to it, is what the main purpose of language arts is – expressing your ideas, emotions, and thoughts through language.
“What are you good at?” I asked one day.
“Does language count?” she said with a laugh. “I am good at learning languages.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I took it from my mom. She learns languages like that,” she exclaimed as she gave a snap with her fingers. “You know how American people, I’m not being racist or anything, but they say that old people don’t learn quickly. Well for my country, that’s wrong, because the oldest people learn like that,” again saying while giving her fingers a snap. “Like English was really hard for my mom, but then she started coming here and she started speaking it. It was kind of the same for me.” It may be worth mentioning again that Teresa speaks six languages; English, French, African-English, Grobul, Tapu, Beach-Grobul. For many mastering a second language is complex and difficult let alone a sixth. Knowing another language gives a person so many benefits. It opens the door to other cultures and helps them understand and appreciate people from other countries. It helps them in achieving a global lens or view of the world, and probably most beneficial is that it gives the person new ways of being able to express themselves as different words in different languages have different meanings.
And directly opposite on the scholastic spectrum from English is Math, which Teresa and I also feel she is very strong in. “Math is the same in any language. So I was always good at math and liked it the best,” she said. For Teresa, someone who has moved around frequently, traveled across national boundaries into worlds with new languages, the one thing that remained constant for her was math. This also seemed to be true for other refugees at the RDC as well. None of them ever really needed help with math because it was the same in any country, so they never had to re-learn the language of it. This was part of the reason Teresa felt it was her best subject.
“The subject I feel I’m best at would be math, because math is like, you can’t translate math, it’s not like languages, it’s just numbers and if you’re like from any country and you know how to do math like subtracting and stuff like that, or dividing or common denominators, if you know that in a country and you move to a different country you can still do that because math is not like languages, everyone understands it.”
“Who Fears: Snakes, Spaders”
Teresa’s Academic Challenges
During his career, Howard Gardner developed the multiple-intelligence theory which says “instead of one kind of general intelligence, there are at least seven different kinds, which include verbal intelligence, musical intelligence, logical-mathematical intelligence, spatial intelligence, body movement intelligence, intelligence to understand oneself, and intelligence to understand others” (Plotnik, 2005, p. 283). The main idea behind it is that intelligence is a relative term, one that really cannot be measured. A person may be very good at math, but who is to say that a person who is very good at art is more or less intelligent. For Teresa, as previously mentioned, she is very good at language and math. However she admits to having weaknesses.
“What subject do you feel, not that you are worst at, but could use the most improvement.”
“Science is one,” she said. “I suck at science, but this year I am doing good. I am getting all A’s in my classes.” It certainly didn’t sound like she was “sucking” to me. But I could relate how sometimes you do well, but you don’t really feel like you are good at it or you just put in the extra effort to study more. Thus, you end up doing well, but it didn’t come easily.
“Why is it hard for you?”
“Because, like science, why is it hard? I don’t know? I guess because of the periodic table, because my teacher said that before the end of the year we need to know the periodic table and the atomic numbers and stuff like that. The concept of science is very hard for me. The way it is taught is easy for me because I mean if I have instruction, I can do my homework very easily, but yea.” While Teresa said that she “sucked” at science, I cannot confirm or deny this claim. The only subjects that we worked on were math and language arts. However, I can say that based on those experiences, her skills as a student I believe would far outweigh her lack of a “scientific intelligence.”
Also, while Teresa has what can only be described as a “gift” for poetry, she does struggle with spelling and grammar. In a “bio poem” we did as a fun poetry exercise one day, she had to list two things that she fears.
“Who fears: snakes, spaders”
Instead of spiders she wrote spaders. While a simple mistake, for a student in the 9th grade, it is not a commonly misspelled word. However, it is crucial to remember who wrote the sentence; Teresa. She is still learning English, and she is still a person with an in-depth history who came to America and had to learn English; it was not her first language. This does not excuse her from not knowing how to spell spider, but it sheds light on explaining it. Even she admits she has problems with spelling.
“What do you have the most trouble with in school?” I asked.
“Spelling.”
“What subject do you feel, not that you are worst at, but could use the most improvement.”
“Science is one,” she said. “I suck at science, but this year I am doing good. I am getting all A’s in my classes.” It certainly didn’t sound like she was “sucking” to me. But I could relate how sometimes you do well, but you don’t really feel like you are good at it or you just put in the extra effort to study more. Thus, you end up doing well, but it didn’t come easily.
“Why is it hard for you?”
“Because, like science, why is it hard? I don’t know? I guess because of the periodic table, because my teacher said that before the end of the year we need to know the periodic table and the atomic numbers and stuff like that. The concept of science is very hard for me. The way it is taught is easy for me because I mean if I have instruction, I can do my homework very easily, but yea.” While Teresa said that she “sucked” at science, I cannot confirm or deny this claim. The only subjects that we worked on were math and language arts. However, I can say that based on those experiences, her skills as a student I believe would far outweigh her lack of a “scientific intelligence.”
Also, while Teresa has what can only be described as a “gift” for poetry, she does struggle with spelling and grammar. In a “bio poem” we did as a fun poetry exercise one day, she had to list two things that she fears.
“Who fears: snakes, spaders”
Instead of spiders she wrote spaders. While a simple mistake, for a student in the 9th grade, it is not a commonly misspelled word. However, it is crucial to remember who wrote the sentence; Teresa. She is still learning English, and she is still a person with an in-depth history who came to America and had to learn English; it was not her first language. This does not excuse her from not knowing how to spell spider, but it sheds light on explaining it. Even she admits she has problems with spelling.
“What do you have the most trouble with in school?” I asked.
“Spelling.”
“We are Like Super Woman”
Teresa’s Social Strengths
Raising your hand to be called on. Forming a line to go outside. Using an “inside” voice. Not talking while a teacher is talking. Walking and not running inside a building. These are all learned social skills. Academia is only one part of a public education. Gaining multiple social experiences and learning these social skills is another large portion. Even on day one, I immediately noticed a social strength Teresa had; she had friends. Walking in, she was laughing, talking, and gossiping with them. To be able to effectively communicate with a person is many times taken for granted, but is ultimately the largest social strength a person can have. For Teresa, she knows how important it is.
“I have an ESL teacher that came in sometimes to help me with English. Like we would do leap frog. Most of my other classes were with her. But like, gym, music, and French I would take with other kids from America. Like, when you come from a different country, if you want to learn the language, you have to talk to people. So I like those classes the best because I get to talk with them in English and learn it better.”
Even the story of her first day at school and how she was unable to speak English and effectively communicate with her teacher showed just how important language is in a social environment. Since she has been able to learn English, though not the official language of the United States but the dominate one and thus the one in power, she has gained the ability to communicate with those around her. And because of this, and an incredibly friendly personality, she has been able to make friends.
“When I was growing up, like when I was twelve, I didn’t have friends, like I didn’t talk to anyone at school until I met my friends, so I’m trying not to lose my friends and it’s not just that but they made me who I am and they do the exact thing that I do, like they stick up for me too so I got to stick up for them. They don’t gossip about me. Like, one time, I was coming from the hallway, and my friend was standing in the doorway with another girl and she was like ‘oh my god, can you believe Teresa, what the heck was with that whatever.’ And my friend was like ‘Oh no you didn’t. I’m sure you not talkin’ about my friend Teresa.’ So I have to stick up for them too. I’m not trying to repay them; it’s just what you do.”
Teresa realizes the importance that friends have on your experience at school. Because of her strong relationships, developed from a grounded sense of self and good social skills, she is able to not only maintain these relationships, but foster them as well.
“Having friends inspires me. It keeps me strong. I wanted to write this book, because at the end of the year I want to write a little book for my grandma. I started the book and I had my friends read it, and they helped me finish the book. So having friends has done a lot for me by teaching me right from wrong. And I choose my friends very carefully, and they are not bad or anything like that, they don’t even curse. They are so pure I can’t believe it,” she laughed. “I’m not exactly pure but yea. When my friends are mad, they don’t say ‘don’t talk to me’ they try to put their feelings away and talk to me and help me.”
“Are most of your friends American?” I asked simply curious of the answer.
“No. I only have one American friend. The other ones are from Iraq, Ethiopia, Japan, China, and Korea.”
“Why do you think you are friends?”
“What makes us friends is. . . we have cool names,” she laughed jokingly. “But no seriously, we really do have cool names. Like our secret names. Like my other friend’s name is Sam, but we call her S to the 5th power because she is five times good.” She laughed again. “We are connected because, well it’s not really because we are from different countries. It’s because we all almost have the same personality and stuff like that. When we put our brains together, we are like super woman.” The amount of conviction and “nothing can stop us” attitude really grabbed my attention. Here are these girls, who are all from different countries, with very diverse backgrounds, having different first languages, who all came to the United States for probably different reasons. Yet, they are the best of friends. They have been able to overcome their differences and see the positive attributes that come out of that. If high school girls can do it, you would think there would be more hope for the rest of the world.
“I have an ESL teacher that came in sometimes to help me with English. Like we would do leap frog. Most of my other classes were with her. But like, gym, music, and French I would take with other kids from America. Like, when you come from a different country, if you want to learn the language, you have to talk to people. So I like those classes the best because I get to talk with them in English and learn it better.”
Even the story of her first day at school and how she was unable to speak English and effectively communicate with her teacher showed just how important language is in a social environment. Since she has been able to learn English, though not the official language of the United States but the dominate one and thus the one in power, she has gained the ability to communicate with those around her. And because of this, and an incredibly friendly personality, she has been able to make friends.
“When I was growing up, like when I was twelve, I didn’t have friends, like I didn’t talk to anyone at school until I met my friends, so I’m trying not to lose my friends and it’s not just that but they made me who I am and they do the exact thing that I do, like they stick up for me too so I got to stick up for them. They don’t gossip about me. Like, one time, I was coming from the hallway, and my friend was standing in the doorway with another girl and she was like ‘oh my god, can you believe Teresa, what the heck was with that whatever.’ And my friend was like ‘Oh no you didn’t. I’m sure you not talkin’ about my friend Teresa.’ So I have to stick up for them too. I’m not trying to repay them; it’s just what you do.”
Teresa realizes the importance that friends have on your experience at school. Because of her strong relationships, developed from a grounded sense of self and good social skills, she is able to not only maintain these relationships, but foster them as well.
“Having friends inspires me. It keeps me strong. I wanted to write this book, because at the end of the year I want to write a little book for my grandma. I started the book and I had my friends read it, and they helped me finish the book. So having friends has done a lot for me by teaching me right from wrong. And I choose my friends very carefully, and they are not bad or anything like that, they don’t even curse. They are so pure I can’t believe it,” she laughed. “I’m not exactly pure but yea. When my friends are mad, they don’t say ‘don’t talk to me’ they try to put their feelings away and talk to me and help me.”
“Are most of your friends American?” I asked simply curious of the answer.
“No. I only have one American friend. The other ones are from Iraq, Ethiopia, Japan, China, and Korea.”
“Why do you think you are friends?”
“What makes us friends is. . . we have cool names,” she laughed jokingly. “But no seriously, we really do have cool names. Like our secret names. Like my other friend’s name is Sam, but we call her S to the 5th power because she is five times good.” She laughed again. “We are connected because, well it’s not really because we are from different countries. It’s because we all almost have the same personality and stuff like that. When we put our brains together, we are like super woman.” The amount of conviction and “nothing can stop us” attitude really grabbed my attention. Here are these girls, who are all from different countries, with very diverse backgrounds, having different first languages, who all came to the United States for probably different reasons. Yet, they are the best of friends. They have been able to overcome their differences and see the positive attributes that come out of that. If high school girls can do it, you would think there would be more hope for the rest of the world.
“I Told the Teacher but She Couldn’t Really Understand Me”
Teresa’s Social Challenges
“One time, when I first came here, I didn’t really know how they dressed here, so I wore an outfit that I would wear back in my country to school. Well, a girl was making fun of me and then she pulled off a rope that was attached on my sleeve. I told the teacher but she couldn’t really understand me, so she asked the girl what happened, but she lied. So, I was sent to the principal’s office and nothing happened to her. It made me cry, and then I just got mad, and I really didn’t want to go to school anymore.” Teresa took a breath after racing through the last sentence. Then she simply continued with her math homework.
For Teresa, her transition to America was hard, as she had already told me. However, this was the first I had really heard of others discriminating against her because of her culture. Yet, on that Thursday, Teresa was not wearing traditional African clothing. Instead, she had on faded blue jeans, a pink tank top, covered by a white Baby Phat hooded zip up. “The challenge, or perhaps the trick, for [Teresa] and so many other students of color, will be learning how to maneuver successfully in one [racial group] without leaving the other behind” (Michie, 1999, p. 67). Yet, the question still remains as to why many of these students assimilate into American culture. Well the answer really isn’t that hard to conclude. “The fact that some kids began to view so-called “American” culture as superior to their own was really no surprise. It was being offered up – consciously or not – as what was normal, average or even ideal. The underlying message seemed to be that if the kids wanted to fit in – and what teenager doesn’t? – they first needed to leave the ways of the antepasados [ancestors] in the distant Mexican dust” (Michie, 1999, p.74).
Socially, Teresa is very solid and grounded. “When I am frustrated,” she began in response to answering another one of my questions, “first I go to myself in the mirror. Then I calm myself down a little. And if I am not really calm, I go to sleep. Because I know, like if I don’t calm myself down, I’m going to just go yell or go crazy. So I go to sleep first, and wake up later, drink a glass of water, and then if I still am a little upset I will talk to my parents. But that sleep really helps.” She knows what she likes, she knows what she doesn’t like, and she knows how people should be treated, fairly. Yet, when she first came to America, not knowing the English language put her at a great disadvantage socially. “School was easier in my country because it was in ‘my’ language.”
While in a country with no official language, it shouldn’t have mattered. But again, in the United States, English is the dominate language, and thus is the language of power. “My counselor said the only way I will learn is if I make English friends.” While I think this is repulsive to tell a child that in order to learn she has to make “English friends” implying that non-English friends will not help her succeed, in the current system, in order for Teresa to be able to succeed, or more so, to be able to succeed with the most ease, she needed to learn English. And she did, quite well in fact. But for a while, not knowing English proved to be a large social challenge.
For Teresa, her transition to America was hard, as she had already told me. However, this was the first I had really heard of others discriminating against her because of her culture. Yet, on that Thursday, Teresa was not wearing traditional African clothing. Instead, she had on faded blue jeans, a pink tank top, covered by a white Baby Phat hooded zip up. “The challenge, or perhaps the trick, for [Teresa] and so many other students of color, will be learning how to maneuver successfully in one [racial group] without leaving the other behind” (Michie, 1999, p. 67). Yet, the question still remains as to why many of these students assimilate into American culture. Well the answer really isn’t that hard to conclude. “The fact that some kids began to view so-called “American” culture as superior to their own was really no surprise. It was being offered up – consciously or not – as what was normal, average or even ideal. The underlying message seemed to be that if the kids wanted to fit in – and what teenager doesn’t? – they first needed to leave the ways of the antepasados [ancestors] in the distant Mexican dust” (Michie, 1999, p.74).
Socially, Teresa is very solid and grounded. “When I am frustrated,” she began in response to answering another one of my questions, “first I go to myself in the mirror. Then I calm myself down a little. And if I am not really calm, I go to sleep. Because I know, like if I don’t calm myself down, I’m going to just go yell or go crazy. So I go to sleep first, and wake up later, drink a glass of water, and then if I still am a little upset I will talk to my parents. But that sleep really helps.” She knows what she likes, she knows what she doesn’t like, and she knows how people should be treated, fairly. Yet, when she first came to America, not knowing the English language put her at a great disadvantage socially. “School was easier in my country because it was in ‘my’ language.”
While in a country with no official language, it shouldn’t have mattered. But again, in the United States, English is the dominate language, and thus is the language of power. “My counselor said the only way I will learn is if I make English friends.” While I think this is repulsive to tell a child that in order to learn she has to make “English friends” implying that non-English friends will not help her succeed, in the current system, in order for Teresa to be able to succeed, or more so, to be able to succeed with the most ease, she needed to learn English. And she did, quite well in fact. But for a while, not knowing English proved to be a large social challenge.
“My Pencil Case Is My Life, Man”
Teresa’s Resources
“What resources for learning do you bring?” We were nearing the very end of the interview questions I had written down. She laughed for a moment and then pointed to her pencil case jokingly. “How so?” I asked, letting her know that she was right on.
“My pencil case is my life, man. I have almost everything in this pencil case, I love to be neat. I have my eraser, my flash drive, my pencils. I have five pencils just in case for backup. I got it from the store, with my money. When I was in Georgia I worked in a salon so I saved my money. So I bought it.”
Teresa has many resources, one of those being her pencil case, or more so what it stands for. While her actual pencil case is a physical resource, even more telling is that she has a pencil case. The fact that Teresa has the items that she needs to learn, pencils, erasers, and even a flash drive, something I would consider a more expensive resources, exemplifies the fact that she does have the resources she needs, or things that will help her be more successful in school. Still, she was not handed these things, she had to work for them, and earn the money herself, something I find even more admirable which I just add to her ever growing list of commendable characteristics.
“Why do you come to the RDC?” I asked this question already knowing my answer for her but I wanted to see what she would say. The fact that I met Teresa at the RDC illustrates another resource she has. She utilizes a program offered to her to get extra help. Her life may have been and may continue to be a “a long, difficult route, but [she has] made the first step in taking responsibility for [her] destinies” (Michie, 1999, xi).
“I come here because if I made a mistake on the homework, I want someone to help me. And also if I don’t understand something, I ask someone. Like every Thursday you help me with all my homework, which is really nice, and so then I don’t have those things to think about and I don’t have to say ‘oh my gosh, my head is hurting.’ So yea.”
Students’ coming to the RDC program is an example of gaining capital. The students are working towards institutionalized capital, or earning credentials, by coming to the program and doing extra work to learn more than what is just taught in class that day. They are working in groups and gaining the experience of working with others, making networks with their classmates, and building relationships of trust, all of which are examples of social capital “the relations between persons to acquire advantages,” (Coleman, 1987, p. 221).
Undeniably a student’s home life will play a large role in their success at school. It’s not to say students in an unstable family are destined to fail and don’t have a hope or a prayer, but it is to say that their journey will be more difficult than most. Teresa has a stable and supportive family. She lives with her father, mother, and her sister. In talking with her, her dad seems to be the biggest influence on her, and her biggest resource at home.
“What makes you smart?”
“Eating apples,” she laughed. “No, I’m just silly. What makes me smart is my focus, and when I am really serious about something like when I’m into it, I put all my thoughts and everything into it.”
“Where do you get that from?”
“My dad.”
“Has he said something to instill this in you?”
“No he’s just smart. But he does say ‘just because you couldn’t do it today, doesn’t mean you can’t do it tomorrow.’ So yea. My dad is very educated. He went to college, he has his degrees. So when I don’t understand something, I just ask him. Because I don’t want to come here every day – too much trouble. And if he doesn’t know I just e-mail my teachers. I have a computer. And if I still can’t do it, my mom would drive me to a friend’s house that could help me.”
“So do you feel you have a strong family support?”
“Yes. Like when my mom is mad, which she’s not all the time but if she is, she just doesn’t talk. But when she’s not mad she says ‘you know what, go to college, do this, do that. Don’t be like me. And when you grow up, don’t be like me. Say ‘be like me because I did this.’ Don’t tell your kids, ‘don’t be like me’ because that is bad advice. Say ‘be like me because I am a strong mom.’ Yea.”
During this conversation I asked her to answer two things. First was to tell me how her family would describe her and the next was to tell me how she would describe herself in one word.
“How would your family describe you?”
“My family would describe me as their princess, except my mom.” She laughed. “Because my little sister is her princess. And my dad would say that my little cousin is his little princess. But my grandma really loves me so she calls me her little princess… and grandma love is the best. But I guess they would say I am courageous, brave, and smart.”
“Describe yourself in only one word.”
“Teresa.” She said with another laugh in a matter of fact tone. “I just am joking. Probably intelligent. I guess, because courageous, bravery, smartness add up to intelligence.” The fact that she took what she thought her family would say about her to sum up how she thought about herself shows me just how important her family is to her.
While being from a different country has its challenges it also holds many resources for her. She has a more global perspective on things, and has experienced much more than most. These experiences can help her in gaining a better understanding of different situations.
“What’s your favorite subject?”
“Does music count?” She laughed. “Does art count or lunch count?” She laughed again.
“Like if you had to choose your favorite academic subject.” I said revising my original question a bit.
“Social Studies because you get to learn a lot about history and stuff and if you are from a different country you can compare your history and the country you’re in now, their history, and see how they are different. And you can see what battles they fought and look see if that country helped your country win a battle. Like France helped America during the British War and stuff and that was a great surprise to me because I thought they were supposed to be fighting against France. I didn’t know anything about American History.” For Teresa, history acts as a break from the routine of memorizing and regurgitating information handed to her. “Scholars have come to recognize knowledge as a social construction. But unfortunately, the ‘school knowledge’ that most students experience is offered up as a given. The role and responsibility of students are merely to accept that given and reproduce it via recitation or writing. Even with the clamor of more critical thinking, memory continues to be the most rewarded skill in the nation’s classrooms. But culturally relevant teaching attempts to help students understand and participate in knowledge-building” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 81). Her history class lets her build her own knowledge using her past experiences as the starting building blocks.
“My pencil case is my life, man. I have almost everything in this pencil case, I love to be neat. I have my eraser, my flash drive, my pencils. I have five pencils just in case for backup. I got it from the store, with my money. When I was in Georgia I worked in a salon so I saved my money. So I bought it.”
Teresa has many resources, one of those being her pencil case, or more so what it stands for. While her actual pencil case is a physical resource, even more telling is that she has a pencil case. The fact that Teresa has the items that she needs to learn, pencils, erasers, and even a flash drive, something I would consider a more expensive resources, exemplifies the fact that she does have the resources she needs, or things that will help her be more successful in school. Still, she was not handed these things, she had to work for them, and earn the money herself, something I find even more admirable which I just add to her ever growing list of commendable characteristics.
“Why do you come to the RDC?” I asked this question already knowing my answer for her but I wanted to see what she would say. The fact that I met Teresa at the RDC illustrates another resource she has. She utilizes a program offered to her to get extra help. Her life may have been and may continue to be a “a long, difficult route, but [she has] made the first step in taking responsibility for [her] destinies” (Michie, 1999, xi).
“I come here because if I made a mistake on the homework, I want someone to help me. And also if I don’t understand something, I ask someone. Like every Thursday you help me with all my homework, which is really nice, and so then I don’t have those things to think about and I don’t have to say ‘oh my gosh, my head is hurting.’ So yea.”
Students’ coming to the RDC program is an example of gaining capital. The students are working towards institutionalized capital, or earning credentials, by coming to the program and doing extra work to learn more than what is just taught in class that day. They are working in groups and gaining the experience of working with others, making networks with their classmates, and building relationships of trust, all of which are examples of social capital “the relations between persons to acquire advantages,” (Coleman, 1987, p. 221).
Undeniably a student’s home life will play a large role in their success at school. It’s not to say students in an unstable family are destined to fail and don’t have a hope or a prayer, but it is to say that their journey will be more difficult than most. Teresa has a stable and supportive family. She lives with her father, mother, and her sister. In talking with her, her dad seems to be the biggest influence on her, and her biggest resource at home.
“What makes you smart?”
“Eating apples,” she laughed. “No, I’m just silly. What makes me smart is my focus, and when I am really serious about something like when I’m into it, I put all my thoughts and everything into it.”
“Where do you get that from?”
“My dad.”
“Has he said something to instill this in you?”
“No he’s just smart. But he does say ‘just because you couldn’t do it today, doesn’t mean you can’t do it tomorrow.’ So yea. My dad is very educated. He went to college, he has his degrees. So when I don’t understand something, I just ask him. Because I don’t want to come here every day – too much trouble. And if he doesn’t know I just e-mail my teachers. I have a computer. And if I still can’t do it, my mom would drive me to a friend’s house that could help me.”
“So do you feel you have a strong family support?”
“Yes. Like when my mom is mad, which she’s not all the time but if she is, she just doesn’t talk. But when she’s not mad she says ‘you know what, go to college, do this, do that. Don’t be like me. And when you grow up, don’t be like me. Say ‘be like me because I did this.’ Don’t tell your kids, ‘don’t be like me’ because that is bad advice. Say ‘be like me because I am a strong mom.’ Yea.”
During this conversation I asked her to answer two things. First was to tell me how her family would describe her and the next was to tell me how she would describe herself in one word.
“How would your family describe you?”
“My family would describe me as their princess, except my mom.” She laughed. “Because my little sister is her princess. And my dad would say that my little cousin is his little princess. But my grandma really loves me so she calls me her little princess… and grandma love is the best. But I guess they would say I am courageous, brave, and smart.”
“Describe yourself in only one word.”
“Teresa.” She said with another laugh in a matter of fact tone. “I just am joking. Probably intelligent. I guess, because courageous, bravery, smartness add up to intelligence.” The fact that she took what she thought her family would say about her to sum up how she thought about herself shows me just how important her family is to her.
While being from a different country has its challenges it also holds many resources for her. She has a more global perspective on things, and has experienced much more than most. These experiences can help her in gaining a better understanding of different situations.
“What’s your favorite subject?”
“Does music count?” She laughed. “Does art count or lunch count?” She laughed again.
“Like if you had to choose your favorite academic subject.” I said revising my original question a bit.
“Social Studies because you get to learn a lot about history and stuff and if you are from a different country you can compare your history and the country you’re in now, their history, and see how they are different. And you can see what battles they fought and look see if that country helped your country win a battle. Like France helped America during the British War and stuff and that was a great surprise to me because I thought they were supposed to be fighting against France. I didn’t know anything about American History.” For Teresa, history acts as a break from the routine of memorizing and regurgitating information handed to her. “Scholars have come to recognize knowledge as a social construction. But unfortunately, the ‘school knowledge’ that most students experience is offered up as a given. The role and responsibility of students are merely to accept that given and reproduce it via recitation or writing. Even with the clamor of more critical thinking, memory continues to be the most rewarded skill in the nation’s classrooms. But culturally relevant teaching attempts to help students understand and participate in knowledge-building” (Ladson-Billings, 1994, p. 81). Her history class lets her build her own knowledge using her past experiences as the starting building blocks.
“Why Do Some Succeed and Others Don’t?”
Redefining My Educational Pedagogy
I have taken the stance of being a multicultural educator now and as I begin to teach in the years to come. It has been a new term to me one that I find to be more and more complex the more I learn and try to understand it. At first, it simply meant celebrating the diversities that we all have. While that is part of it, there is so much more to it. While only the next step in understanding, I have learned that to celebrate a culture one must first understand and accept the views and beliefs associated with that culture. It’s not about necessarily agreeing with them, but knowing why they feel that way and being able to relate to it in some way.
After being able to do that, multi-cultural education then becomes more so about recognizing the social, cultural, and other forms of capital and the systems of power that work in and out of the system of education and how different dominate or repressed groups are defined within these systems. Now, it begins to examine the question “Why do some succeed and others don’t?” It is important to understand that “[teachers] really have to understand these kids [nonperforming students] as human people who have basic needs that are not being answered. The temptation is always to look at these [kids] and just put everything in black and white. But when is anything black and white? It just isn’t” (Michie, 1999, p. 140). And as a teacher, not only do I have the responsibility to teach my students about these systems of power, but I have an opportunity, together with my students, to discover how they can change it and put things into action to create real change.
After being able to do that, multi-cultural education then becomes more so about recognizing the social, cultural, and other forms of capital and the systems of power that work in and out of the system of education and how different dominate or repressed groups are defined within these systems. Now, it begins to examine the question “Why do some succeed and others don’t?” It is important to understand that “[teachers] really have to understand these kids [nonperforming students] as human people who have basic needs that are not being answered. The temptation is always to look at these [kids] and just put everything in black and white. But when is anything black and white? It just isn’t” (Michie, 1999, p. 140). And as a teacher, not only do I have the responsibility to teach my students about these systems of power, but I have an opportunity, together with my students, to discover how they can change it and put things into action to create real change.
“I Am Not Ready”
My Final Thoughts
As I finish another semester of a long and never ending educational journey, two things have happened. I have been re-affirmed each day that I do indeed want to be a teacher. The concepts I learn, the ideas I discuss, and the realizations about the world and how it operates in relation to education have all shown me that I am indeed on the right path knowing that education may be challenging work, but more importantly it is meaningful work. The other thing I have come away with, is knowing that I am not ready. I have a feeling, that even when I graduate, I might still have this same feeling. The difference between then and now is that now I have the time to study the ideas, themes, and questions of education. Then, I will have done this, but will have only more ideas, themes and questions I wish to study. These are only answered through continual study.
The continual “education of a teacher” (Michie, 1999, p. xxi) is never ending. To be successful for my students, the process of continually learning, not just from the books, but learning about and from my students will be the determining factor of my own success. Knowing my students, their backgrounds, culture, academic and social strengths and weaknesses, and resources, will all be vital to my success to my students as their teacher. “Teachers must be prepared to validate the identities that their students have taken on as part of growing up” (MacLeod, 1995, p. 262). While that is all well and good, I still have to ask, “how?” It took me a full semester, personal one on one attention, and numerous interviews to even just scratch the surface at trying to understand Teresa. “In truth, we seldom have time to talk about individual students at all, unless one of them is being suspended or has broken some sort of rule” (Michie, 1999, p. 180).
I realize there is so much to learn, and that it will never stop even after many years of teaching. Additionally, what will be most important is to never get set in one path. I will simply look forward to those “glorious occasional days of genius…willing to take risks and make mistakes, willing to meander off the track to get on the track, to change plans midstream if need be” (Michie, 1999, p. x). Being fluid and open to change will allow me to give the best to my students, and keep me open minded so they can give their best to themselves.
The continual “education of a teacher” (Michie, 1999, p. xxi) is never ending. To be successful for my students, the process of continually learning, not just from the books, but learning about and from my students will be the determining factor of my own success. Knowing my students, their backgrounds, culture, academic and social strengths and weaknesses, and resources, will all be vital to my success to my students as their teacher. “Teachers must be prepared to validate the identities that their students have taken on as part of growing up” (MacLeod, 1995, p. 262). While that is all well and good, I still have to ask, “how?” It took me a full semester, personal one on one attention, and numerous interviews to even just scratch the surface at trying to understand Teresa. “In truth, we seldom have time to talk about individual students at all, unless one of them is being suspended or has broken some sort of rule” (Michie, 1999, p. 180).
I realize there is so much to learn, and that it will never stop even after many years of teaching. Additionally, what will be most important is to never get set in one path. I will simply look forward to those “glorious occasional days of genius…willing to take risks and make mistakes, willing to meander off the track to get on the track, to change plans midstream if need be” (Michie, 1999, p. x). Being fluid and open to change will allow me to give the best to my students, and keep me open minded so they can give their best to themselves.
“We Can Change The World”
A Final Thought from Gregory Michie
“I plan to change the world. [These words were written by a student about themselves in their bio found in the program of a high school play.] A naïve notion? Maybe. Clichéd? Perhaps. But [the student’s] bold declaration nonetheless crystallizes why I – and I think most teachers – chose our vocation in the first place, and, more importantly, why we keep on keeping one. At the core of our work is the belief, despite the distressing signs around you, that the world is indeed changeable; that it can be transformed into a better, more just, more peaceful place; and that the kids who show up in our classrooms each day not only deserve such a world, but can be instrumental in helping to bring it about. Their voices are abiding reminders that there is something to hope for in spite of the hopelessness that seems to be closing in around us – something tangible, something real, something in the here and now” (Michie, 1999, p. 180). I have no doubt that Teresa is and will continue to be one of these amazing, inspirational, and influential voices! “We can make a difference. We can change the world” (Michie, 1999, p. 181). I completely agree and plan to do so.
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