Voice of the Week: Anita

Anita is a sweet, shy 17-year-old who came here with her mother from Mexico a year ago. She had attended high school in her hometown, and enrolled at Edison when she arrived in town. She likes to read and to study and was used to attending school; yet, after only a couple of months in the U.S., she dropped out. She’s currently working in a factory in St. Louis Park.

These days, the future outlook for high school dropouts is quite bleak, and you can’t see a young person in this situation without asking why. Anita’s main reason for leaving school was simple: her family needs the money. When Anita’s father left her mother a couple of years ago, her mother decided to come to the U.S. to work. Anita was the oldest and most able to help contribute to the family income, so she came along. She initially enrolled in high school, but when the decision was between earning income to support the family or continuing to pursue her education, work came first.

But her schooling experience also helped to make that decision easier. Anita enrolled in English Language Learner (ELL) courses upon arrival due to her limited English skills. Makes sense, right? But this was a part of her trouble: in a class with other Spanish-speakers, she often relied on them to provide translation rather than forcing herself to learn the English words and phrases she was supposed to be developing. Thus, her language skill development was slow. On the other hand, there were other teachers who appeared to be impatient with her language skills—who refused to entertain questions in Spanish, for example, even if she wasn’t sure how to ask in English. Finally, she found herself learning long vocabulary lists (and anyone who has ever taken a language class can relate to this): colors, fruits and vegetables, the seasons. Useful words, to be sure, but perhaps not the most engaging or helpful things to be learning in an environment where you are expected to quickly learn how to communicate in sentences, not just words.

"I had trouble paying attention," Anita told us. No wonder, then, with a mother pressing for income at the same time, that Anita’s education came to a rapid end.

Anita enjoyed attending her school, though; she had made good friends, she didn’t mind the bus commute to and from school, and if she were to return to school, she’d like to go back to the same MPS school she left. Her biggest request for what the school could do differently? Have teachers who are "buena honda", which roughly translates to "cool". When we pressed her on this, she elaborated with a typical student’s wish list: interesting, approachable, willing to work with students. Anita wanted to return to school, to get her diploma and maybe even to go to college. However, when we asked her about what she would study there, or what her hopes for her future were, she drew a blank. It seemed that Anita hadn’t had many opportunities to dream.