By Bill Beggs Jr.
The group of young men and women were rapt as Ron Gubitz, managing director of programs for Teach For America, explained what was in store as they prepared for two-year teaching commitments in the St. Louis metro area’s most troubled school districts: Wellston… Normandy… and the City of St. Louis.
Most of these 21-something college grads hadn’t set out to teach. They graduated with business degrees, or had double (or triple) majors. Quite a few had planned to go into law, or IT, or psychology. Many had received full academic scholarships. The world is at their feet.
Instead, they have chosen to help urban youth get the education they deserve—it is an honor and a privilege, they say, to provide them with something that is their right to have. But these kids have been denied this because of institutional racism, civil negligence. Yes, points out one TFA corps member, everyone must one day pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. But first, they must have boots.
Whether suburban or urban, white or people of color, from privileged or lower-middle-class backgrounds, TFA corps members don’t mince words.
Elsie Urueta graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a degree in international business and marketing, minoring in psychology. She planned on law school, but…
“Now that I’ve started working with these kids, how could I stop?” asks Urueta, who just wrapped up her first year teaching 6th-graders with special needs at St. Louis Charter School, at Hampton and Fyler on The Hill.
Urueta grew up in a Tulsa, Okla., household with an absent father. Her mom made do with cramped quarters and food stamps in a rough Hispanic neighborhood. Despite the added hardship, she moved the family to where the schools were better. Urueta credits this for her success.
“Literally two miles away, my friends struggled,” Urueta says. “It wasn’t fair that just because I lived in a certain area, I got more than they did—and that’s an excellent education.”
Gubitz illustrated the great disparity in educational opportunities throughout St. Louis by ZIP code: “In 63141, kids are being trained to be governors. In 63101, they’re being trained to be governed.
“The students in St. Louis deserve so much more, and they can’t wait any longer. They don’t have enough time.”
The incoming class of about 100 will double the complement here, says Scott Baier, TFA’s executive director in St. Louis. Baier himself is a prime example of TFA alumni, two-thirds of whom stay involved with the organization in some capacity after completing their two-year commitment.
After graduating from Notre Dame in 1996 and mulling over entering law school, he visited a friend who was teaching in McAllen, Texas, at the southern tip of the state about five miles from the U.S.-Mexico border. The experience convinced Baier to give it a go himself.
“I thought I was going to do it for two years and be done,” he says, “but 13 years later I’m still involved.”
When now-CEO Wendy Kopp started TFA in 1990, people scoffed at her proposition: To attract the smartest young grads to come aboard. But they have. The incoming class for the 2009-10 school year is 4,100 nationwide—which is equal to the total number of TFA corps members for the organization’s first 10 years.
Many of the newest educational innovations come from the TFA teaching experience. Indeed, it’s like turning an aircraft carrier around, it will take awhile. But it’s the system that is changing, and the ranks of those who will facilitate long-term change are growing: Nationwide, by 2015 there will be 50,000 TFA alumni; by 2020, 80,000, says Baier.
Teach For America recruits on more than 450 college campuses, seeking seniors and recent graduates from all academic majors and backgrounds who have demonstrated outstanding achievement, perseverance, and leadership. Admission was even more selective than in previous years, with a record 35,000 applying to join. At more than 130 colleges and universities, more than 5 percent of the senior class applied, including 11 percent of all seniors at Ivy League universities. Here, 6 percent at Saint Louis University, and 9 percent at Washington University, applied to TFA.
Navneet Jaswal’s family emigrated from India about 35 years ago, and she’s a born-and-bred St. Louisan now living in St. Charles. A SLU grad, Jaswal majored in political science, international studies and women’s studies; she’s presently completing a master’s in political science. She’s a member of the incoming corps, and after five weeks of intensive training this summer will begin her two-year commitment at a school here once the “Lou Crew”—the group of TFA veterans, administrators and advisors—get to know her better and select a school that will be a good fit with her skill set.
Jaswal already has an idea of what she’s up against when she begins teaching special education this fall. She worked for awhile during her junior year at Northwest Academy, a magnet school on Riverview in the city.
“I know what to expect,” she says. “I know it will be challenging. After three hours, I was drained.”
But why stay here, when with her background she’d be a perfect fit in Washington, D.C.? Well, she says, maybe she’ll get to that one day.
“Doing this in my own city is more important to me. Some of these kids have other challenges before they even get to school: No breakfast, violence in the home, having to care for siblings. With a good education, these kids can stand toe to toe with people of privilege, and I want to facilitate that process.”
Jaswal and Urueta rejoined their peers where the introductory session was winding down. While all the cheering and clapping had made it seem like a pep rally, the young men and women demonstrated how serious they are about “moving the chain” in
St. Louis. To that end, they’d attached dozens of notes to a banner at the front of the room.
For himself, Baier is blunt about why he is committed to Teach For America: “This is the most pressing and pertinent civil-rights issue facing our country.”
