The Best Teacher in America

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by Brian

Jaime Escalante died last week.  Every math teacher knows who Escalante was, because he was the subject of the inspiring 1988 film "Stand and Deliver."  Fourteen of his students were accused of cheating on the AP Calculus exam in 1982 by the Educational Testing Service.  Twelve of them retook the test under strict supervision and passed again. The reason they were suspected of cheating was not so much the similarity of their answers, but that in their high school, Garfield, 85 percent of the students were low income, most of the parents were
grade-school dropouts, faculty morale was bad, and expectations were low.

Jay Mathews wrote recently about Escalante's teaching. He published a book about him in 1988 titled "Escalante: The Best Teacher in America".  He also writes a blog for The Washington Post called Class Struggle that is well worth checking out.  In the article about Escalante he says: " The stunning success at Garfield led U.S. presidents to endorse
Escalante's view that impoverished children can achieve as much as
affluent kids if they are given enough extra study time and
encouragement to learn".

I have to ask: is that really all there is to it?  Give them extra study time and encouragement?  Because I'm doing that, and it's not working.  The problem seems to be that while I am giving them extra study time, they're not taking it.  And while I encourage them to work hard and get smart, they just don't do the work.

I think what was missed by many in Escalante's wonderful story was that the extra study time was not given, it was mandatory.  He demanded it: three hours after school, and extra time on Saturdays and in the summer.  Remember too that Escalante was there for those extra hours.  (See Mark's post about extra hours.) And the encouragement was often a little sarcastic, which can work in a relationship with a lot of trust, but can also get you in a lot of trouble pretty quickly in this day.  

So what can I do to be like Jaime Escalante?  Because I really do want to be like him.

4 thoughts on “The Best Teacher in America

  1. Jolynn Tarwater

    If systems continue with the pathway of firing all teachers at an underperforming schools, such as the school in Rhode Island, then the great role models like Escalante and Esquith may never happen again. They will just be fired because the test scores across the board at their school may not be high enough. Hmmm.

  2. Tom

    I’m with you,Brian, and you too, Kristin. I admired Mr. Escalante for who he was and what he did for his students, but at the same time, I cannot afford to spend the time he spent with them.

  3. Kristin

    The success of Escalante – and teachers like Rafe Esquith, who gets his fifth graders to perform Shakespeare – is a combination of their tremendous skills as teachers, their deep understanding of the content, and their ability to motivate human beings. These talents are things many of us have, struggle to perfect, or can learn to do if encouraged.
    But what they also did was invest a lot of their personal time into their students.
    And like you, Brian, I can get to a certain point with my skills and my passion, but I have two little girls at home, and I can’t stay at school until dinnertime. I can’t be here on Saturday, like Esquith does, to tutor my current and past students. I should say, I wouldn’t even if I were paid, because my daughters are so young. But, my husband is also a teacher, and between the two of us one would take the extended work day. I’m sure many teachers would, and I would once my daughters were grown.
    So here is my question for legislatures and policy-makers: if we have clear evidence that Esquith and Escalante’s methods work, why aren’t schools given the power to extend the school day? Why isn’t there a funded Saturday school? Escalante and Esquith are held up as the perfect teachers, but the expectation seems to be that every teacher should work for free. That’s a lousy business model.

  4. Bob Heiny

    I’m guessing, based on the tone of your post on this blog, Brian, that you’re on track with Jamie. Thanks, Jamie, for your great example. I knew another Garfield math teacher who came before you. He, too, made a lasting mark on his students, including one of my best friends who earned his Ph.D. from a Big 10 school and set part of the ed world on its ear in the 1960s and ’70s using with learners what he learned in the Garfield neighborhood. All three were insistant, focused, and direct in classes. They reduced trials-and-errors during lessons to as few as possible. The more they did so, the fewer non-class instruction they used to get students to the high level of academic performance. May you three RIP and best wishes to Brian.

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