'Minority teachers remain rare'

Telegram & Gazette

Read Time

1 Minute

Jennifer Guzman "11, a teacher at Nativity School of Worcester, chose her career because the hands-on experience in the Holy Cross Teacher Education Program won her over. But that wasn’t always the case.

The psychology major, from Lawrence, Mass., tells the Telegram & Gazette “she planned to pursue a graduate degree in clinical psychology and help people like her brother, who struggled with an emotional disorder. One thing she did not want to do was teach.”

Then her sophomore years, during an elective course,  she was assigned to observe a math class at Burncoat High School. The reporter writes, “The teacher was thrilled to have a bilingual visitor — Ms. Guzman speaks Spanish — and Ms. Guzman soon found herself working closely with two students, both of whom had come from Puerto Rico and did not speak English. One was a teenage mother who was determined to go to college. The other was a boy who had stopped trying. But by the end of the semester, he earned an 80 on a quiz.”

After that, Guzman said she was hooked. “It was the most rewarding experience that I had ever felt,” she said.

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Cristal Steuer.

More Stories

View All Stories