I love Glee right now.  Not because it’s entertaining, clever, funny or has rockin’ music, although all of those are true, but because it is so gloriously true to itself. I watched what I guess is being dubbed the “bullying episode,” largely about Kurt trying to make sense of his place in school as the only openly gay student.  What I love is that the writers, actors, etc. have managed to weave this very important storyline into the fabric and tone of the show seamlessly.  As I see it, this isn’t "the bullying episode.” It’s the experience of gay students everywhere, as filtered through a lens that is both gloriously unrealistic (A school that shuts down because the all (cool) boys glee club is holding an impromptu performance of Katy Perry music? Tell me more!) and unflinchingly honest.

Issues around equality and civil rights for the GLBTQ community have caught my attention since middle school. I have no idea where I learned about them, as they certainly didn’t come up in Catholic school, wedged between math fact “Holy Cards” and listening to Santana and Billy Joel in Theology class. I remember the feeling of setting foot on BC’s campus and seeing my first opportunity to DO something - anything - of value, in this case, collecting signatures on a petition for a GSA.  I’ve never once doubted that I am straight but I suppose in my simplistic mind, treating gay people as any less than equal just seems entirely ridiculous, illogical and indefensible. (My perspective taking can be a bit lacking when it comes to people who are intolerant, bigoted, etc.)

Right now, there is a sudden flood of support, much of it streaming through Facebook and YouTube, for gay rights and particularly in support of GLBTQ students. As a teacher, the part of my job that I take most seriously is my role as an advocate for my students, whose needs and differences connect mostly to language, culture and immigration status.  However, as a teacher of a very visible group of “different” students, this rise in awareness, advocacy and true compassion for GLBTQ students still hits close to home and stirs up a sense of passion and urgency that I feel I’ve been missing. 


There is a whirlwind of new information and content every hour. Take the It Gets Better Project, a collection of videos on YouTube aimed at supporting GLBTQ teens and with the very immediate goal of reaching students before they reach the point of desperation, self-injury or suicide. There are videos from celebrities like Neil Patrick Harris, Chris Colfer (Kurt from Glee) and Tim Gunn, from politicians like President Obama, Secretary Clinton and Texas city councilman Joel Burns, from groups like the casts of Memphis and Wicked, Google employees (including a friend from BC) and of course, regular joes like us. Facebook and YouTube videos of new songs with clear, unmistakable messages of support (original songs performed by Katy Perry ("Firework"), Todrick Hall (“It Gets Better”), young stars of Broadway) are going viral, maybe even more than LOLcats! I can be a technological stick in the mud sometimes as I watch print losing its value but the IGB Project, the fact that we can literally watch people pleading with kids to stick around, promising them that we can make the world a safer place for them… It is just awe-inspiring to me. I recently read a blog post about how these videos will become the historical record of this period of time and how not only is history being made (as it is to some degree in any movement) but we are watching and creating the artifacts that will document it for the future. That idea is fascinating to me on an academic level but on a more emotional level, I feel proud to be a witness to a time in which people - gay and straight - were joined in giving a damn and presenting a united front. Phew, ok internet.  I give.  Your addictive nature does in fact make the world a better place.

In addition to IGB, there are organizations – major ones like HRC (Human Rights Campaign) and GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network) as well as newer ones like We Give a Damn, True Colors, etc. that are working to advocate for GLBTQ teens and adults and to encourage straight people to get off their butts and speak out. If nearly two-thirds of GLBTQ students don’t feel safe in our schools and almost a third have skipped school on account of that fear, schools have a problem that is bigger than putting up a nice mission statement and keeping an ear out for fights. I so want this to become something that all people of all gender identities who come in contact with students can buy into and work toward openly.  We should not be made to feel like rabble-rousers for seeking to support the GLBTQ students as we are welcome to do for students of color, low-income students, etc.

The flood of information out there can bring me to an emotional brink at times but I truly hope it is doing the same to others.  This is not a time for panels, cursory discussions in student support teams or empty, politically-motivated statements of support.  This has to be a time in which we take the energy of this paradigm shift in openness and use it to propel school and community cultures forward. Kids can’t wait and it’s high time we, as a culture, begin to hold one another to a higher standard of behavior and teach and model for all people of all ages that acceptance, kindness and respect are simply nonnegotiable in our society.

Ugh, clichés

In an effort to bring some sort of conclusion to my last entry while in a zombie-like state of near sleep, I apparently tapped out one of the trite clichés I hate the most.  I do NOT see myself as bringing some messianic light into the darkness of my students worlds. Ugh.  That brings to mind an argument that arose in a grad class over the summer regarding interracial adoption. (The class was on cultural competence.) The crux was whether or not a family of one race raising a child of another - namely the most common pairing of a white family with an African, African-American or Latin-American baby - can raise the child without doing the child a psychological/social disservice and with an appropriate understanding of who he or she is in the grand scheme of race.  It got rather heated and having absolutely no background in the subject, my opinions were limited.  The one I did feel most passionately, however, is that any family who takes on a child with the intention of "saving" him or her is already heading down the wrong path.

Returning to the streetlight image, the light I see myself casting is not the traditional literary/religious symbol of hope, goodness, righteousness or what have you.  It is simply a way to help make sense of the world around them.  We see better in the light and that's what I aim to provide.  I like the streetlight image because it casts light on stories that are often hidden from view in our society.  The modern immigrant story has been reduced to an extremely one dimensional one in the political/social arenas. My political leanings certainly come into play here as I will openly declare that I believe that the U.S. desperately needs a better global understanding to understand the complexities of illegal immigration. Another teacher recently noted something that we in ELL-land marvel at constantly: the stories that come out in my classroom are unlike anything that is spoken in any other room in our school.  I credit the streetlight image once again for this. Students need a space to make sense of a crazy world, one that is even crazier for those on the margins. My room is the place where they can come in, turn off the noise and try to make sense of it all. (They can also watch music videos on YouTube and read magazines on the beanbag chairs in their free time...C'mon, people, it ain't Utopia!)

I don't know if I'm clarifying or adding to the superhero complex I am trying so hard not to emit.  If I engage my brain day to day, I come up with all kinds of questions and opinions on rights, politics, ethics, psychology and so on.  On the surface, it's just your average everyday classroom with words of the day, class discussion, journal entries and task-avoidance. My philosophy allows me to believe that at the right moment and given the right conditions, it can be more for the student that needs it.  That's the light I hope exists.

(Believe it or not, there are actually humorous, light-hearted occurrences in my classroom as well.  I'll try to weave some in on the blog, lest I give off the impression I am running a meditation center-rehab-halfway house-daycare-institution. One at a time, perhaps, but not all.)

Name That Metaphor

While I’m getting warmed up as far as blogging is concerned, let me explain why I chose the title of my blog. A few years ago, I fell in love with the Broadway hit (and 2008 Tony Award winner for Best Musical), “In the Heights.” I taught the song lyrics for months and took the class to see it on Broadway in April 2009. On the surface, it has great stories about the experiences of Latinos, immigrants and young people in the U.S.  On a deeper level, however, it spoke to me about how we interact with one another and support (or don’t support) goals, dreams, etc.  One of the recurring symbols is a streetlight as the play takes place in the Washington Heights neighborhood of NYC.  The main character, Usnavi, acts as a narrator-lead, guiding the audience through the interactions of the characters.  He’s a cultural broker of sorts, making sense of these interactions of characters from all kinds of backgrounds.  In the finale, he sings,

"Yeah, I'm a streetlight, chillin' in the heat.

I illuminate the stories of the people in the street.

Some have happy endings, some are bittersweet

But I know them all and that's what makes my life complete." 

Those lines have become very important to me, particularly in the way I frame my job. Being an ELL teacher is very different than being any other kind of teacher.  On the surface, when kids don’t know grammar, I teach them grammar.  We write essays, read articles, hold debates, etc.  Not too different from any other class with a language bent.  Sure, there’s a challenge in that I often have students who function much less in English than any native speaker.  I’ve had students who turn white when I say the unfamiliar word “welcome” or who haven’t been in school since sixth grade.  All of those are unique challenges.  Especially when non-speakers end up in classes where they are assigned 3-page essays on parallels between the responsibilities of today’s young adults and the baby boomers. But I digress…this is not a venting session.

The phrase I came up with in my first year of teaching to encapsulate the world of ELL is that “we deal in stories.” While on paper, our responsibilities are grammar, writing, reading, etc., those are not what flash through my mind when I think of my job.  I think of the day when a student called to say she couldn’t come to school because the family had run out of oil and were freezing.  I think of standing in the parking lot of a student’s apartment complex, being offered a beer from his father after celebrating his son’s graduation. I think of calling a student’s health insurance company to help her add family members to her plan.  I think of what felt like the weekly visit to the nurse to announce the latest pregnancy in ELL-world.  Teaching ELL is really an exercise in managing, triaging and often absorbing the stories that flow through the classroom daily. It means being the first responder for every student’s story, good, bad or indifferent.  The hardest part of my job, as I see it, is teaching students that DON’T understand that kind of struggle. This year, I am constantly wrestling with how I interact with students who feel and act entitled, unsympathetic and/or rude while wanting to devote all my time to those who carry heavy burdens and even heavier stories.  It’s a delicate balance of professionalism and superhero syndrome.

Somewhere in between there, though, is where I see the streetlight. I’m an observer but hopefully, I can bring just a little light into some lives that need an advocate.  And if they can distinguish between a noun, verb and adjective when I’m done, that would be stupendous as well.

And away we go...

At long last, I am returning to the blogging world. True, the posts probably will not have the cultural uniqueness of my study abroad shenanigans but quite frankly, there are too many thoughts in my head and not enough outlets and so, onward!  At the risk of sounding prosaic, I just want to set out why on earth my thoughts are now ending up on the interwebs.  A mission statement of sorts. 

In high school and college, I was a thinker - not always a brainiac but definitely one whose specialty was academia.  For awhile, I was driven by grades but I came to understand that it was the act of thinking that really got me going.  Ever since I graduated from college, though, I’m finding that opportunities to just revel in ideas are less prevalent than I expected.  As a teacher, I definitely strategize, plan, organize, manage, etc. but I find I’m not really working the cerebellum like I used to. After a few years without that constant stream of intellectual stimuli, I feel a little worn down.  I recently started to nag my former student, Eduardo, now a freshman in college, to start blogging.  His experiences and stories are so unique and fascinating (not to mention, numerous) that they just need to be captured.  As I worked on him, it occurred to me that I wouldn’t mind the extra mental storage space while we’re at it.

This blog is just my way of taking those passing thoughts that I don’t usually have a chance to share or develop and tacking them up somewhere.  If someone finds them intriguing, perhaps some trippy, metaphysical brain connection will occur.  If not, hey, welcome to the anonymity of the internet age.  So here’s to the glorious indulgence of thought!