What Teaching In Boston Means

1.14.10 By José Valenzuela

On January 12, 2010, an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0 struck Haiti, its effects centered in Port-au-Prince.

On January 13, 2010, I went into work. TechBoston Lower Academy school has an overwhelming Haitian-American population (98% of the students in Sheltered English Instruction classes are Haitian). In one of my sections, a quarter of the class is Haitian. On this day, the mood was somber. There was a real absence of much of the shrill, high-energy noise coming from the hallways. Although there was some of the natural curiosity exhibited by adolescents, the students who were normally loud and (sometimes) rude recognized the gravity of the day, it seemed. Unfortunately the students of Boston are no strangers to trauma and death. I will say that my eighth grade students may push my buttons, and some have not reached their true potential in my class yet. However, no one could ever criticize the way these kids stick up for each other. This situation has been no different. Like many around the world, we were still in shock, and without much information, we tried to go about our day.

On January 14, 2010, I returned to school, and many of my students still had not heard good news. With a full day of news images, and mostly a lack of information about survivors, grief was beginning to set in. Our Student Support Team has been amazing throughout the whole process, and grief counselors were brought in. I have wanted to help. You see, I was born in the Dominican Republic. We share an island with Haiti, and while my country was spared the same devastation, there has been an inseparable connection between the two countries since their pre-Columbian times. In Boston, there are little of the same tensions that unfortunately still plague our shared border, which has roots in our wars for independence and the debilitating reign of the Dominican Republic’s dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo (a name my father shares, a reminder that he too lived during this reign of terror). My family originally hails from the western frontier, and there are some Haitian roots in my family tree. The bonds on the island called “Aytí” by the Taínos cannot be separated. I think this bond is something I have felt with my Haitian students, above all others except my Latina/o students. We understand each other. And it makes the feelings of helplessness felt by many Americans about this crisis that much more amplified inside of me.

I will donate to the American Red Cross and Partners in Health, and I hope you do too. But I have also opened my arms to my students. Like all the public school students of Boston, these are my kids. And so I did what any parent would do for their child: I cared for them. When I found out some of my students had not eaten all day because of their grief, I told them I would buy them snacks and sports drinks, and I did. I told them, “You need to be able to take care of yourself in a time like this. You have to eat. But if you’re unable to take care of yourself, then I will take care of you.” Saying that won’t help them find their lost family members, but I hope the right words will let them know that there are friends in my school that will help them get through this. We almost always state that disastrous circumstances demand that we “put things in perspective,” but I don’t think my perspective has changed. I knew all along that I had a group of wonderful, thoughtful, and caring students. The balance has changed, though. Since September, they have sustained me; since January 12, I have known that I will work even harder to sustain and support them.