【英语语言学习】从黑社会老大女儿变为明星老师

So I grew up in East Los Angeles, not even realizing I was poor. My dad was a high-ranking gang member who ran the streets. Everyone knew who I was, so I thought I was a pretty big deal, and I was protected, and even though my dad spent most of my life in and out of jail, I had an amazing mom who was just fiercely independent. She worked at the local high school as a secretary in the dean's office, so she got to see all the kids that got thrown out of class, for whatever reason, who were waiting to be disciplined. Man, her office was packed.

 

So, see, kids like us, we have a lot of things to deal with outside of school, and sometimes we're just not ready to focus. But that doesn't mean that we can't. It just takes a little bit more. Like, I remember one day I found my dad convulsing, foaming¹ at the mouth, OD-ing on the bathroom floor. Really, do you think that doing my homework that night was at the top of my priority list? Not so much.

 

But I really needed a support network, a group of people who were going to help me make sure that I wasn't going to be a victim of my own circumstance, that they were going to push me beyond what I even thought I could do. I needed teachers, in the classroom, every day, who were going to say, "You can move beyond that." And unfortunately, the local junior high was not going to offer that. It was gang-infested, huge teacher turnover² rate.

 

So my mom said, "You're going on a bus an hour and a half away from where we live every day." So for the next two years, that's what I did. I took a school bus to the fancy side of town. And eventually, I ended up at a school where there was a mixture. There were some people who were really gang-affiliated, and then there were those of us really trying to make it to high school. Well, trying to stay out of trouble was a little unavoidable. You had to survive. You just had to do things sometimes. So there were a lot of teachers who were like, "She's never going to make it. She has an issue with authority. She's not going to go anywhere." Some teachers completely wrote me off as a lost cause.

 

But then, they were very surprised when I graduated from high school. I was accepted to Pepperdine University, and I came back to the same school that I attended to be a special ed assistant.

 

And then I told them, "I want to be a teacher."

 

And boy, they were like, "What? Why? Why would you want to do that?"

 

So I began my teaching career at the exact same middle school that I attended, and I really wanted to try to save more kids who were just like me. And so every year, I share my background with my kids, because they need to know that everyone has a story, everyone has a struggle, and everyone needs help along the way. And I am going to be their help along the way.

 

So as a rookie teacher, I created opportunity. I had a kid one day come into my class having been stabbed the night before.

 

I was like, "You need to go to a hospital, the school nurse, something."

 

He's like, "No, Miss, I'm not going. I need to be in class because I need to graduate." So he knew that I was not going to let him be a victim of his circumstance, but we were going to push forward and keep moving on. And this idea of creating a safe haven³ for our kids and getting to know exactly what they're going through, getting to know their families -- I wanted that, but I couldn't do it in a school with 1,600 kids, and teachers turning over year after year after year. How do you get to build those relationships?

 

So we created a new school. And we created the San Fernando Institute for Applied⁴ Media. And we made sure that we were still attached to our school district for funding, for support. But with that, we were going to gain freedom: freedom to hire the teachers that we knew were going to be effective; freedom to control the curriculum so that we're not doing lesson 1.2 on page five, no; and freedom to control a budget, to spend money where it matters, not how a district or a state says you have to do it. We wanted those freedoms. But now, shifting an entire paradigm⁵, it hasn't been an easy journey, nor is it even complete. But we had to do it. Our community deserved a new way of doing things.

 

And as the very first pilot middle school in all of Los Angeles Unified⁶ School District, you better believe there was some opposition⁷. And it was out of fear -- fear of, well, what if they get it wrong? Yeah, what if we get it wrong? But what if we get it right? And we did. So even though teachers were against it because we employ one-year contracts -- you can't teach, or you don't want to teach, you don't get to be at my school with my kids.

 

(Applause)

 

So in our third year, how did we do it? Well, we're making school worth coming to every day. We make our kids feel like they matter to us. We make our curriculum rigorous and relevant to them, and they use all the technology that they're used to. Laptops, computers, tablets -- you name it, they have it. Animation⁸, software, moviemaking software, they have it all. And because we connect it to what they're doing — For example, they made public service announcements for the Cancer Society. These were played in the local trolley⁹ system. Teaching elements of persuasion¹⁰, it doesn't get any more real than that. Our state test scores have gone up more than 80 points since we've become our own school.

 

But it's taken all stakeholders, working together -- teachers and principals on one-year contracts, working over and above and beyond their contract hours without compensation. And it takes a school board member who is going to lobby for you and say, "Know, the district is trying to impose this, but you have the freedom to do otherwise." And it takes an active parent center who is not only there, showing a presence every day, but who is part of our governance, making decisions for their kids, our kids.

 

Because why should our students have to go so far away from where they live? They deserve a quality school in their neighborhood, a school that they can be proud to say they attend, and a school that the community can be proud of as well, and they need teachers to fight for them every day and empower them to move beyond their circumstances. Because it's time that kids like me stop being the exception, and we become the norm.

1 foaming   

adj.布满泡沫的；发泡

参考例句：

• He looked like a madman, foaming at the mouth. 他口吐白沫，看上去像个疯子。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He is foaming at the mouth about the committee's decision. 他正为委员会的决定大发其火。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 turnover   

n.人员流动率，人事变动率；营业额，成交量

参考例句：

• The store greatly reduced the prices to make a quick turnover.这家商店实行大减价以迅速周转资金。
• Our turnover actually increased last year.去年我们的营业额竟然增加了。

3 haven   

n.安全的地方，避难所，庇护所

参考例句：

• It's a real haven at the end of a busy working day.忙碌了一整天后，这真是一个安乐窝。
• The school library is a little haven of peace and quiet.学校的图书馆是一个和平且安静的小避风港。

4 applied   

adj.应用的；v.应用，适用

参考例句：

• She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
• This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。

5 paradigm   

n.例子，模范，词形变化表

参考例句：

• He had become the paradigm of the successful man. 他已经成为成功人士的典范。
• Moreover,the results of this research can be the new learning paradigm for digital design studios.除此之外，本研究的研究成果也可以为数位设计课程建立一个新的学习范例。

6 unified   

(unify 的过去式和过去分词)； 统一的； 统一标准的； 一元化的

参考例句：

• The teacher unified the answer of her pupil with hers. 老师核对了学生的答案。
• The First Emperor of Qin unified China in 221 B.C. 秦始皇于公元前221年统一中国。

7 opposition   

n.反对，敌对

参考例句：

• The party leader is facing opposition in his own backyard.该党领袖在自己的党內遇到了反对。
• The police tried to break down the prisoner's opposition.警察设法制住了那个囚犯的反抗。

8 animation   

n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作

参考例句：

• They are full of animation as they talked about their childhood.当他们谈及童年的往事时都非常兴奋。
• The animation of China made a great progress.中国的卡通片制作取得很大发展。

9 trolley   

n.手推车，台车；无轨电车；有轨电车

参考例句：

• The waiter had brought the sweet trolley.侍者已经推来了甜食推车。
• In a library,books are moved on a trolley.在图书馆，书籍是放在台车上搬动的。

10 persuasion   

n.劝说；说服；持有某种信仰的宗派

参考例句：

• He decided to leave only after much persuasion.经过多方劝说，他才决定离开。
• After a lot of persuasion,she agreed to go.经过多次劝说后，她同意去了。