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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Teaching for America
Aired January 01, 2003 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, HOST: Good evening again. I'm Aaron Brown and we're bringing you this special holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT through the miracle of videotape. I'm off with my family tonight. We hope you're with your family as well. And wherever you are, we wish you the best in this holiday season.
Tonight, we devote the program to a group of people who truly are, one by one, changing lives. They are not the people you might expect. We hear every day about the scientist who cures a disease, or the firefighter who saves a life, or perhaps the leader who steps forward. On one level tonight's program is about nothing as grand ass that. In another way, there is nothing more important. It is about who inspires the future leader, who first gets the scientist interested in the science. And it's about planting those seeds in some pretty barren soil.
We focus tonight on people who are committing two years of their lives to teach, not in the country's best schools either. At a time when many of their peers are going on to law school or getting their MBAs instead, they're working with kids, kids who deal with a lot of adversity in life. Perhaps the cruelest of all being low expectations.
Tonight's edition of NEWSNIGHT is called "Teaching for America." First, though, the news of the hour. And for that we turn to our colleagues in Atlanta.
(NEWSBREAK)
BROWN: We begin with a pop quiz. Name a teacher who made a difference in your life. Maybe it was Mrs. Anderson back in the fifth grade or Ms. Frazier in the eighth. Perhaps Mr. Pratt, your senior year in high school. The nation's most troubled public schools need good teachers, teachers with energy and enthusiasm, teachers committed to closing the achievement gap. And the stakes are so high. Children who grow up in low-income areas are seven times less likely to graduate from college, which of course means they are seven times less likely to have bright futures than children in high-income areas. That sets the stage.
Our story tonight is reported by NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen.
BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thank you. In 1989, a young Princeton University student, Wendy Copp, had an idea -- recruit young college graduates to teach for two years in the neediest public schools, form a kind of domestic Peace Corps for teachers. That corps, called "Teach for America" is now in its 13th year.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): July 2002, welcoming ceremonies for the newest corps of Teach for America teachers. Just two weeks ago, they were students at some of the nation's best colleges and universities: Yale, Princeton, University of Michigan, UCLA. They are proven leaders, campus activists, team captains, fraternity presidents, editors of their college papers. It is a highly select group. 14,000 applied to teach this year. 1,700 were accepted. Meet four of them.
MEAGHAN BROWN, PRINCETON GRADUATE: My name is Meaghan Brown. And I went to Princeton University. I was an English major. Freshman year, I was pre-med.
NISSEN: Meaghan Brown applied to Teach for America after hearing a Princeton graduate she knew talk about the rewards of being a corps member.
M. BROWN: I saw myself teaching little people. Third grade definitely was my idea, shorter than me.
NISSEN: That's unlikely. Meaghan will be teaching seventh grade science in the Bronx. Meaghan and three other Teach for American teachers will share an apartment in Manhattan. They already share their versions of the same dream.
M. BROWN: For one student 10 years from now to look back and say yes, Ms. Brown, she's the reason I am where I am now.
MATT KELLY, BROWN UNIV. GRADUATE: My name is Matt Kelly. I just graduated from Brown University with a concentration in Sociology.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly grew up in Haverford, Pennsylvania on the Philadelphia Main Line.
KELLY: I went to private schools my whole education. I feel like because I've been so privileged, I owe it to all the people who have helped me to try and give back in some ways.
NISSEN: Matt has one early concern about being a teacher. He doesn't look the part.
M. BROWN: I'm only 22. I'm not easily recognizable as a teacher. I'm hoping to steal some of my dad's ties.
NISSEN: He chooses ties that are summer weight. Matt will be teaching high school English in the Mississippi Delta.
M. BROWN: Trying to understand the culture there, and trying to become a part of it I think is going to be the greatest challenge to me.
TARINDA WHITE, NORTHWESTERN UNIV. GRADUATE: My name is Tarinda White. I graduated from Northwestern University on June 22nd. Hurray. My major was in Education and Social Policy.
NISSEN: Tarinda was headed for graduate school in Clinical Psychology when she was recruited to Teach for America.
WHITE: There was a professor on my campus who yanked me literally by the arm, and said you have to do this. You have to do this. She said, you know, these children who are left behind in our education systems are predominantly African-American and they're predominantly Hispanic. I said okay, what does me community need right now?
NISSEN: Tarinda will be teaching elementary school in greater Los Angeles. Graduate school will wait.
MICHAEL GARCIA, UNIV. OF MICH. GRADUATE: My name is Michael Garcia and I just graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in Biological Psychology. I grew up in a small town in South Texas, it's called Farr (ph), Texas. It's about 10 minutes north of Mexico. So we're way down south.
NISSEN: Mike Garcia went to poorly funded local public schools, chronically short on teachers, textbooks and desks.
GARCIA: You go into a room that you would you think could only fit 20, 25 people, and they would stick 35, 40 kids in there.
NISSEN: Mike never thought about college until young first-year teachers at his high school changed his thinking and his life.
GARCIA: They pushed me. They pushed, not only me but everybody in the classroom.
NISSEN: And inspired him to apply himself to his studies, then to apply for college. He now wants to do for others what those teachers did for him. Mike will be teaching elementary school in inner city Baltimore, if he can solve his own necktie problems. He's never worn a tie, but a tie is the mark of a professional, a reminder to students of what can be achieved.
GARCIA: Success would mean getting every single, you know, kid in my classroom to realize that education is the key to success.
NISSEN: At opening ceremonies, that message is underscored by Teach for America's founder, Wendy Copp.
WENDY COPP, FOUNDER, TEACH FOR AMERICA: While it is exceedingly difficult to close the achievement gap for your students, though, we do know that it is possible.
NISSEN: Possible but daunting. Most corps members have no formal education training, no teaching experience. They get both in five weeks of teacher boot camp, summer institutes held in Houston and New York. They take seminars in child development, learning disabilities, literacy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's called text-to-text connection. NISSEN: They move quickly from being student to facing students. Corps members teach summer school in the Houston and New York City public schools.
GARCIA: What sound does a "CH" make?
NISSEN: They get exposure to the age group, the academic levels, the behavior and the attitudes of some of the students they'll be teaching in the fall. They teach in teams. They work with students one-on-one.
GARCIA: What letter is it in English? "D." Good, good.
NISSEN: Their teaching is carefully monitored by master teachers. The new corps members make plenty of rookie mistakes. Matt Kelly doesn't bring a watch to the high school English class he's teaching. He loses track of time, drops a key part of his lesson plan. His evaluation lasts almost as long as his class.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You felt the constraints of time. And had you had more time in the class, you would have gotten more response from them.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to go ahead and start because you guys are going to be going to workshops at 1:20.
NISSEN: The days are tightly scheduled. Five weeks go by in a blur of lesson planning, grading papers, making posters, mastering universal teacher sign language. At the end of five weeks, most corps members are both exhausted and exhilarated.
CROWD: We can do it! We can do it!
NISSEN: They can hardly wait to go out and start teaching, start making a difference. Not a one of them has any idea just how hard that's going to be.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Up next on our special, "Teaching for America, we'll see how our teachers make it through their first seven days of teaching. This is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: The new teachers are placed where they're needed most, in 18 inner city and rural areas around the country. They're hired by local school districts. They're paid the starting salary of a first- year teacher. For most that works out to about $30,000 a year. Yet almost all the new teachers are delighted. Their student loans are deferred for the two years they teach, and they have challenging work, hard work, right out of college. They don't know just how challenging it is until their first week on the job.
So here again, Beth Nissen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARCIA: I want to you listen carefully. A, B, C, D, E, F...
NISSEN: First week of first grade. Mike Garcia starts with the basics, a new improved version of the alphabet song.
GROUP: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z.
GARCIA: Good!
NISSEN: Mike is scrambling to assess his 15 students, how well they know and can write the alphabet and numbers from 1 to 10. Mike notices many of the students write their numbers and letters backwards.
GARCIA: Does a 3 look like that? Yes, it's really confusing, I know. Sometimes it gets hard.
I'm looking for things. You look for things like dyslexia, you know, things like that.
NISSEN: And problems like pencil grip.
GARCIA: There's one girl, Chandria, who holds her pencil like that so I'm going to address that.
NISSEN: If he can get and keep their attention.
GARCIA: Everybody listen up. Quiet coyote. Let me see it.
NISSEN: He uses a trick he learned at summer institute.
GARCIA: Let me see your quiet coyote. I do this and I'm like, you know, When your mouth is closed, your ears are open. And it's funny, because it's a nice cute little saying, but if you catch me at a bad time, I'm just yelling to them like "quiet coyote, quiet coyote."
NISSEN: There are behavior rules in Mr. Garcia's classroom. Violators get two warnings, then a five minute time out in the corner.
GARCIA: I gave you a warning and you did it again. You know what happens after the warning, right? They know I'm not kidding. They know I don't joke around.
NISSEN: That's because the stakes are so high.
GARCIA: Show me what a plus sign looks like.
NISSEN: First grade is the first real academic year. It's when many children learn to read, learn fundamental mathematics.
GARCIA: Is that a plus sign?
GROUP: No! GARCIA: What's this?
GROUP: A plus sign!
GARCIA: A plus sign, right.
NISSEN: Mike tries to keep to his ambitious lesson plan, but it's hard.
GARCIA: How many of you need to go to the restroom?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Me!
GARCIA: You all need to go to the restroom. All right...
NISSEN: He's learned to run the frequent bathroom trips like a drill sergeant.
GARCIA: Okay now, boys, I don't want to have to go in there and see you flushing the toilet again and again. You've been doing it the past two times. If it happens again, we are never going to the bathroom again.
NISSEN: Bathroom dawdling eats up precious class time.
GARCIA: Okay, girls, your time is up! Mr. Garcia's class, let's go. Boys, your time is up. Mr. Garcia's class, let's go.
NISSEN: First grade isn't easy for a first-time teacher.
GARCIA: Can I read you something?
GROUP: No!
GARCIA: Are you pinching him?
NISSEN: His kids act up. His kids cry.
GARCIA: They're little babies. You know, you have to bring in this maternal instinct into it. And you know, I don't think I'm good at it.
I just want to see you with one carpet.
I'm having a hard time. I don't think at this point that I've taught them anything that is of importance. Today is only the fourth day, but I want to see, you know, progress.
WHITE: Shh, quiet, quiet. No more animal noises.
NISSEN: Tarinda White has survived the first week of teaching second grade.
WHITE: I felt like I was in a circus. There was too many things going on at once. I was just like, oh, my gosh. Okay, you go to the restroom. You, go get some water. Here's a pencil. I have 20 students all together and 17 are Hispanic. Their first language is English. My kids can pretty much understand the language, and they can communicate to me in the language.
NISSEN: Regardless of first language, most all her students have scored poorly on early math and reading tests. By fourth grade, children in low-income communities in California are two to three grade levels behind in math, three to four grade levels behind in reading.
After her informal student assessments, Tarinda somewhat encouraged.
WHITE: Out of the 20, I have 18 who I know for sure can read.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At the door of the first little pig.
WHITE: Beyond that, I think I have about 15 who are really strong writers. 15 out of 20.
NISSEN: It's the other five children she's already worried about.
WHITE: Right now, they're still drawing pictures for me. It's a task just to get their name on their paper. I'm worried about them getting further behind because I'm trying to keep up with the pace of the majority of the students. They're saying "I need help, I need help," but I'm trying to make sure everyone is on task.
NISSEN: Tarinda has already identified two barriers to keeping everyone on task. The first is utterly unexpected.
WHITE: Do you have a pencil? Do you have a pencil? They're not sharpened? Pencils! Pencils take up so much time. I need to sharpen my pencil. I lost my pencil. Can I borrow a pencil? Oh, my pencil is not as sharp as her pencil. Pencils are driving me crazy.
NISSEN: Her other challenge -- Maurice.
WHITE: Maurice, no, no, no, in line. Give it to me until the end of the day. Maurice, you have three seconds to come over here and sit down. Crystal and Maurice, you're going to be partners, okay?
MAURICE: No.
WHITE: Yes. Shh!
NISSEN: When Tarinda can get Maurice to focus, he learns.
WHITE: All right! Give me a high five. That was good.
NISSEN: But keeping him focused, keeping him upright, isn't easy.
WHITE: What makes someone a best friend?
NISSEN: Tarinda works to keep herself focused on her goals for her class.
WHITE: By Halloween, I want my students writing paragraphs. Like I want each and every one of them to be able to express every single thing they want in writing.
NISSEN: No exceptions. Same goal for every last one of her students.
M. BROWN: Ladies and gentlemen, folks, the answer that was on the board was correct.
NISSEN: It's been a rough start for Meaghan Brown, the seventh grade science teacher in the Bronx.
M. BROWN: I'm going to wait until I have quiet in this room and then we're going to do a really fun experiment.
These have conceivably been the seven most miserable days of my life. I really feel like I have zero control over any of my students. They're just all over the place, out of their seat, out of the room, constantly talking. During the summer, I was teaching a class of somewhere between 12 and 18, and now have I between 25 and 30.
Rolando, Akim, Shatara.
So my class has doubled in size and quadrupled in management issues at least. This morning it was sort of like why am I doing this?
NISSEN: She isn't even doing what she'd prepared for.
M. BROWN: And our four is in the seventh place?
NISSEN: On the second day of school, Meaghan was told she'd be teaching math, as well as science.
M. BROWN: Think of it as a Pacman...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eating.
M. BROWN: ...or an alligator eating. You're always going to eat the bigger number.
NISSEN: A few of her students are up to grade level, but more than two-thirds of New York City's middle school students failed the state's math exam last year.
M. BROWN: The fact is that a lot of my students have gaps from the fourth, fifth and sixth grade that need to be filled before we can get started on the real seventh grade material.
NISSEN: At least she has math textbooks.
M. BROWN: It's taken me a week and a half to get books for all my class, but I have a full set of math books and half a set of science books. What did you guys infer?
NISSEN: Teaching science, physics, and chemistry is a challenge for other reasons.
M. BROWN: My classroom has no running water. In fact, my entire floor has no running water right now. I may actually ask my students to do experiments at home for homework.
M. BROWN: Everyone has their homework sheet?
GROUP: Yes.
NISSEN: If she can get them to do homework. She's already concerned about homework, tardiness, attendance.
M. BROWN: There are four students I have never seen.
NISSEN: Meaghan has asked her students to write out their long term goals. Most want to get through middle school, pass eighth grade. Only a few have higher aspirations. Meaghan worries that those goals are at risk if she can't get control of her classroom.
M. BROWN: Tina, you need to sit down. Jimmy. Shikira, that's enough.
SHIKIRA: I don't care. She's pushing at me.
M. BROWN: They can see that their classmates are out of their seats and not paying attention and not on task. It prevents them from being highly motivated to get work done, because they feel like no one in the class is getting anything done, so why should they be working? I feel so completely helpless. I don't feel like I have any clue of what I'm doing or any control or any direction. I just hope when I finally do gain control of my classroom, it's not too late.
KELLY: When the bell goes, it should be quiet. You're going to write for 10 minutes. It's 11:49 by my watch right now.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly now has a watch. He needs it to keep his six 11th grade English classes on time.
KELLY: I have about 130 students, depending upon how many show up. Most of my classes are listed at between say 23 and 28 students, but usually slightly over 20 show up.
NISSEN: After one week, he has a rough assessment of his students' writing and reading skills.
KELLY: Out of my 130 students, I would say about 30 to 35 are reading and writing at their grade level. And that might be a highest estimate.
Start correcting these sentences.
NISSEN: Most write poorly. KELLY: Subject/verb agreement doesn't really mean much to a lot of kids. Possessives is kind of out the window. The big problem is that they write like they speak. They don't know the difference between doing and during because in -- with a southern accent, it kind of sounds the same.
NISSEN: The Delta accent, compounded by local teen speak and universal teen mumble is a problem for Matt.
KELLY: The first couple days I'd say I'm sorry I didn't hear you, there was too much noise. Or I'd try and make up an excuse for them to repeat it. And they'd say it again and I still wouldn't get it.
NISSEN: Matt is supposed to be teaching American literature, but only a few of his students read well enough to manage a novel. Even if they did, the school doesn't have enough copies of any one novel for 130 students.
KELLY: I can't give a kid a book and say, "Take this home and read 20 pages," because we only have 30 books.
NISSEN: To encourage his kids to read, Matt has stocked a classroom bookcase with popular paperbacks he's brought from home.
KELLY: Over here, I've got the shelf set up. There's some Stephen King books, some "S-files" books.
Kids, like after class, will come by and say, Mr. Kelly, can I take a book? I'm like, yes, please take the book. Read something.
NISSEN: Matt tries hard to make class and homework fun, so his students will show up, will stay in school. He had hoped there would be a few students he could coax, coach towards college. If they're in his classes, he hasn't found them yet.
KELLY: Shh!! Listen up.
A lot of the kids that I get by 11th grade have been really turned off by education. They're just trying to get through. In a lot of ways, they've been pushed through the system. They're very far behind.
I'll see you all Friday.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Coming up next, going above and beyond what the job requires. Our "Teaching for America" special continues on NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: It comes up almost every time teachers anywhere ask for more pay. Someone will make the argument that teachers have it very easy, they get their entire summers off, they get holidays off, and, by the way, they only work from eight to three. Not so, it turns out, as every Teach For America teacher can tell you.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A teacher's day starts early.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've been getting up between 5:30 and 5:45 every morning. It takes me 40 minutes to get to school in the morning. I'm at school between 7:00 and 7:15.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get out breakfast and then try and get to school around 7:00. Get everything together, if I have handouts.
WENDY KOPP, PRESIDENT/FOUNDER, TEACH FOR AMERICA: If you're a teacher in one of these schools, in order to be successful, you are going to have to go way above and beyond what our society thinks of as a teacher's job.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly starts teaching an hour before school starts, working one on one with students who need extra help.
KELLY: But it's in three words, so you know it's a prepositional phrase.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can we all please stand for the pledge? I pledge allegiance to the flag...
NISSEN: But the school day usually starts around 8:00 a.m.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five, four, three, two, one, thank you.
The whole day is just go, go, go, go because I don't want to cheat my kids out of a good education.
NISSEN: Most teachers are on their feet for the next seven hours, doing their best to teach.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do all animals have the same kind of covering?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, they don't.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Velocity is just a fancy word for speed.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: When you write a letter, you need to have the date.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what is a thesis statement?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: It's the main idea.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When do you feel more resistance from the air, when you're going really, really slow or really, really fast?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Please, raise your hand.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jimmy! Andrea!
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: What?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do not, do not, do not use your fingers because once we start adding bigger numbers, you don't have enough fingers to count that many numbers.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What operation could you do between these to make it a smaller fraction?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many are covered by skin.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're almost in there. It's just like from a big wave, tropical.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, the bell is about to go. I'll be here after school if you want to go over three paragraph essays or anything else.
NISSEN: School is out around 3:00, but most Teach For America teachers still have hours of work to do. Matt Kelly tutors after school, too. Tarinda White stays late to work with Vivian, who is lagging behind her second grade classmates.
WHITE: Vivian, she's reading on kindergarten level. So I give her a full hour after school.
What next there?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WHITE: That's OK. You do it, it's OK.
KOPP: They're maximizing every minute of the school day to move their kids from Point A to Point B and then they're not stopping with the constraints of the school day. You know, when they need more time, they figure out a way to get their kids there early, how to get them to stay late. They know kids in low income communities, when they're given the opportunities they deserve, absolutely can achieve at high levels.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: They reach home. Give me high five.
WHITE: Good job. I am so proud of you.
NISSEN: They regularly work 10 and 12 hour days. Their principals say Teach For America teachers are often the last to leave school at the end of the day. Many go from school to school, take evening classes in education towards master's degrees and teacher certification.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And then they've got something to take home with them.
NISSEN: When teachers do get home, their work day isn't over. There are phone calls to make to students' parents.
M. BROWN: Hi, this is Megan Brown. I'm Victoria's teacher. Did she tell you she has a math test tomorrow?
This is Miss. Brown. I'm Gary's teacher.
Today, the chatting was out of control.
This is Miss. Brown. I'm Tershel's (ph) teacher. I just wanted to make sure Tershel was all right since she wasn't at school today. No.
NISSEN: And then they have their own homework to do, reviewing student performance, grading papers, grading papers, grading papers. Ahead of them, the next school day, the next chance to teach.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, we'll have more of our special look at Teach For America.
But first a short break and a news update.
COMMERCIAL
BROWN: We're going to continue with our NEWSNIGHT special, Teaching For America.
We've been following the lives of four young people as they spend their first year teaching. We've watched their training. We've seen their first few weeks with students.
And joining us again to continue telling their story is CNN's Beth Nissen. BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, each semester, the rookie Teach For America teachers have come to know their students' academic strengths and weaknesses. They have also learned a great deal about their students' lives outside school and how profoundly that can affect their work in school.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NISSEN (voice-over): By late October, a few of Mike Garcia's first graders are reading and writing. Many are blending alphabet sounds into words.
GARCIA: Five. Five.
NISSEN: The students can do simple math, minus one, adding.
GARCIA: He skips numbers. He can't add, he can't subtract.
NISSEN: Mike wants Allen (ph) evaluated for learning disabilities, for lead poisoning.
GARCIA: It's definitely prevalent in my classroom that most students in this school, you know, have been exposed to lead poisoning.
NISSEN: They're exposed to much more in the low income, high crime neighborhoods of West Baltimore that Mike says affects them in school.
GARCIA: Who wants to learn their ABCs when you're hungry? I mean who wants to, you know, learn about adding when, you know, you saw your cousin shot to death right in front of you or you saw so and so get shot, you know, last night?
NISSEN: Mike tries to make his classroom a clean and cozy haven. He brings in a table full of food for the class Halloween party.
GARCIA: Who's never had pumpkin pie? I want you to try your best to follow with your finger.
NISSEN: In November, Mike's students take their first standardized test. Mike is stunned by the results.
GARCIA: My kids, as a class, scored a seven percent out of 100 percent. It's pretty stressful, you know, on my part to try to find out what's wrong and what I can do to change it.
Now, that's the problem.
NISSEN: Mike revises his lesson plans, tries again.
GARCIA: Now, I need you to go to page 160.
NISSEN: Two weeks before Christmas, he thinks he sees some small progress in math, reading and a breakthrough in a writing assignment.
GARCIA: Each kid did three or four sentences. Each kid was obviously trying their hardest to spell words and I just had one of those moments where I smiled and thought oh, OK. I guess they are getting something.
I personally believe that my kids will do a lot better in the future. I think they're going to surprise a lot of people with their next tests. They are some really good things going on in this classroom.
NISSEN: Just blocks from the Linwood, California school where Turunda White is teaching, a sidewalk shrine for a man killed in a drive-by shooting the night before. Just across the street from the school, police make an arrest. A recent police manhunt put Turunda's second grade class into lockdown.
WHITE: They were scared. They were like oh, Miss. White, they're going to start shooting. We should get down on the floor. We should get under our desks.
NISSEN: Turunda knows some of her students live in rough neighborhoods, have tough lives.
WHITE: I have students who are homeless. I have students whose fathers are in prison. I have students who have never seen their fathers.
NISSEN: Yet she sets equally high goals for all her second graders, no exceptions, no excuses. She wants them all reading at third grade level by the end of second grade.
WHITE: You have to expect the best from them. I have a chance to catch the students now before they fall through the cracks.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: And he went on the floor for his last (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WHITE: Good. Good reading.
NISSEN: By late November, five of her students are reading above grade level.
WHITE: Now, you're going to look through the story for all of the words that have the long I sound.
NISSEN: The rest are learning quickly. Vivian has made marked progress.
WHITE: She's getting Cs now on her spelling where she could not even form a word before.
NISSEN: As for Maurice, Turunda has discovered the power of the shrewd seating plan.
WHITE: He's at a table with all girls who are really serious about learning and they make sure he stays on path.
Give me your best handwriting.
NISSEN: Turunda has been teaching for only four months, but she sees the difference she's made.
WHITE: When they say hey, that's a noun, that's a common noun, that's a proper noun, I feel like, wow, I taught them that.
And I look at myself in the mirror and I say I'm a teacher. I am a teacher.
NISSEN: She looks at her students and sees 20 reasons to be a teacher.
WHITE: I am doing my best so that these students do get a fair chance, so they do get an equal opportunity and I'm helping to give that by giving them a quality education.
MEGAN BROWN: Who can tell me what it's called?
NISSEN: Megan Brown is now teaching seventh grade English in addition to science and math. Most of her 28 students are struggling.
BROWN: Is it really tough? Bingo. Five or six students are failing all three subjects that I teach, English, math and science. And about two thirds of the class are failing at least one subject.
NISSEN: Megan says she, too, is failing.
BROWN: My number one failure is classroom management, just the ability to keep them quiet or at least on path. I can't get them to show me or each other respect in the classroom.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: You guys ain't watching no lesson. Nobody's listening.
BROWN: I just feel like, like they're losing an entire year, and that's my responsibility.
NISSEN: Megan finds small comfort in those few students who are listening, are learning.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: You put the one on the bottom and the two on the top.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Yes, you put the one on the bottom and the two on the top.
BROWN: Those five or six students who are learning are not learning as much as they should be because they're being distracted and the class is being distracted by the other 25.
I'm leaving.
NISSEN: Megan says the problem is her lack of experience.
BROWN: I know that there are teachers who could come in here and have them be quiet and have them do their work. I've seen it. There are teachers in this building who can do it.
I'm waiting still.
I think that if I were a little more experienced, I could handle them all better.
NISSEN: Megan has been promised help after the holiday break, regular coaching by experienced teachers. In the meantime, she learns what she can, teaches what she can day by day.
BROWN: Guys, straight and quiet. I am not kidding.
NISSEN: It is the morning of the nine weeks test for Matt Kelly's eleventh grade English classes. Matt does all he can to spike up his students.
KELLY: Come on, it's the nine weeks test. There we go.
NISSEN: The test is a practice for the Arkansas standardized tests in the spring. Students are tested on reading comprehension, identifying parts of speech. They have to write a three paragraph essay, which Matt has been drilling them on since September.
KELLY: My students are in eleventh grade and some of them have never written a three paragraph essay. They don't really know how to do it.
NISSEN: Students take the test in late October. Matt has their scores by December.
KELLY: The results of the nine weeks test were pretty disappointing. There were eight multiple choice questions. Most kids got between four and six questions right. Most of my eleventh grade students are reading on a seventh or eighth grade level.
NISSEN: Matt steps up his efforts, starts his students reading a play he thinks they can relate to, August Wilson's (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
KELLY: All I wanted them to do was change the job description, give everybody a chance to drive a truck.
NISSEN: The play engages his students in class, but most just don't see the relevance of literature and essays and grammar to their lives outside school.
KELLY: A body at rest stays at rest and Helen has been at rest for a while. A lot of them, their goal is just to graduate and move away.
NISSEN: Matt has already lost one student, Rico, before graduation. Matt had confronted Rico about not doing assignments, cutting class.
KELLY: It turned out that his dad's on drugs, he ends up meeting a girl and moving in with her and her child into the projects in Helena.
NISSEN: Rico left school a month ago. Matt still has his last assignment.
KELLY: They had to make a coat of arms for themself and this is the one Rico made, which is him at a graduation podium. They have the same dreams as everybody else, but no one's giving them the chance to fulfill those dreams. I guess we've made some progress, but it's just, the idea of equal education is just so far away.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COMMERCIAL
BROWN: Placing energetic and committed young teachers in some of the nation's neediest schools is only part of the Teach For America mission. The other part is marshalling the energies and firsthand experience of former Teach For America teachers after their two year commitments in the classroom.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDREW WARREN, Teacher: All right, to be or not to be?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: That is the question.
NISSEN (voice-over): Teach For America now has more than 6,000 alumni. Sixty percent of them still work in education. Andrew Warren teaches just across the hall from Matt Kelly in Helena, Arkansas. He finished his Teach For America commitment last year, but stayed on.
Just across town, former Corps member Scott Shirey (ph) is the director of a new charter school.
SCOTT SHIREY: You know, the trick is how do you broaden your sphere of influence so you can reach more students, reach more lives, have a greater impact?
KOPPP: When we talk about reaching the day when all kids have the chance to attain an excellent education, what we're really talking about is massive systematic change.
NISSEN: Change from within.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Talk to your class, OK?
NISSEN: Former Corps members are now working as school administrators. Nicole Soloman (ph) is principal of Ralph Bunche Elementary School in Compton, California.
NICOLE SOLOMAN, TEACHER: Let's hear the motto on three. One, two, three.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Ree (ph), ree, ree.
SOLOMAN: And in Spanish?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Rah, rah, rah.
SOLOMAN: OK, have a beautiful day, Ting and Wendy, and thank you.
JULIE MACOUDA, SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER: All those in favor, please show by raising your hands.
NISSEN: Julie Macouda is helping shape education policy in Washington, D.C. as a member of the school board.
MACOUDA: It passes unanimously.
NISSEN: The nation's top education leaders are impressed.
ROD PAIGE, U.S. SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: The Teach For America spirit expands outside the classroom into the other parts of the community that influence the environment where students learn and where teachers teach.
NISSEN: Former Corps members such as Chicago pediatrician Sarah Van Orman (ph) are working to improve the health of low income children.
SARAH VAN ORMAN, PEDIATRICAIN: It's the runny nose, the coughing, and that that triggers the asthma.
NISSEN: Mark Levine opened a credit union in the New York City neighborhood where he was a Teach For America teacher.
MARK LEVINE, FOUNDER, CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE: We've made loans to families who have got their first home computers. We've had families who have called us to pay for a college education. If we want every child to have an equal chance in life, we have to address education, but also we have to make sure that they're well fed, they receive good health care, that their folks have a good job, that they have good housing.
KOPPP: There is so much more to be done and it's that that's fueling our sense of urgency to say we have to take this to a higher level, we have to grow this effort.
NISSEN: Teach For America has 2,500 teachers now in classrooms. Within three years, it hopes to have 4,000, helping students achieve.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a gigantic task, but you start with one student at a time. And if you can impact one student, you can impact two students. And if you can impact two students, you can impact four.
NISSEN: And can, over time, have a profound impact on what millions of the nation's children learn and what kind of chance they will have in life.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NISSEN: This project took the hard work of four principal camera crews over six months and they deserve thanks by name. In Los Angeles, Tom Larsen (ph) and Jim Fallen (ph). In Helena, Arkansas, Jerry Hatton (ph) and Tracy Duncan (ph). In Baltimore, Reggie Fenlah (ph) and Elizabeth Zofo (ph). And in New York, Fred Shang (ph) and Roy McClain (ph). Our gifted editor was Alamah Duglas (ph).
But our primary thanks go to Megan Brown, Mike Garcia, Matt Kelly and Turunda White for letting us into their classrooms, for sharing their small triumphs and continuing struggles.
BROWN: And our thanks to you for sharing it all with us on this holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT.
Thanks for joining us.
I'm Aaron Brown.
We'll see you soon.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
AARON BROWN, HOST: Good evening again. I'm Aaron Brown and we're bringing you this special holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT through the miracle of videotape. I'm off with my family tonight. We hope you're with your family as well. And wherever you are, we wish you the best in this holiday season.
Tonight, we devote the program to a group of people who truly are, one by one, changing lives. They are not the people you might expect. We hear every day about the scientist who cures a disease, or the firefighter who saves a life, or perhaps the leader who steps forward. On one level tonight's program is about nothing as grand ass that. In another way, there is nothing more important. It is about who inspires the future leader, who first gets the scientist interested in the science. And it's about planting those seeds in some pretty barren soil.
We focus tonight on people who are committing two years of their lives to teach, not in the country's best schools either. At a time when many of their peers are going on to law school or getting their MBAs instead, they're working with kids, kids who deal with a lot of adversity in life. Perhaps the cruelest of all being low expectations.
Tonight's edition of NEWSNIGHT is called "Teaching for America>
Aired January 1, 2003 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, HOST: Good evening again. I'm Aaron Brown and we're bringing you this special holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT through the miracle of videotape. I'm off with my family tonight. We hope you're with your family as well. And wherever you are, we wish you the best in this holiday season.
Tonight, we devote the program to a group of people who truly are, one by one, changing lives. They are not the people you might expect. We hear every day about the scientist who cures a disease, or the firefighter who saves a life, or perhaps the leader who steps forward. On one level tonight's program is about nothing as grand ass that. In another way, there is nothing more important. It is about who inspires the future leader, who first gets the scientist interested in the science. And it's about planting those seeds in some pretty barren soil.
We focus tonight on people who are committing two years of their lives to teach, not in the country's best schools either. At a time when many of their peers are going on to law school or getting their MBAs instead, they're working with kids, kids who deal with a lot of adversity in life. Perhaps the cruelest of all being low expectations.
Tonight's edition of NEWSNIGHT is called "Teaching for America." First, though, the news of the hour. And for that we turn to our colleagues in Atlanta.
(NEWSBREAK)
BROWN: We begin with a pop quiz. Name a teacher who made a difference in your life. Maybe it was Mrs. Anderson back in the fifth grade or Ms. Frazier in the eighth. Perhaps Mr. Pratt, your senior year in high school. The nation's most troubled public schools need good teachers, teachers with energy and enthusiasm, teachers committed to closing the achievement gap. And the stakes are so high. Children who grow up in low-income areas are seven times less likely to graduate from college, which of course means they are seven times less likely to have bright futures than children in high-income areas. That sets the stage.
Our story tonight is reported by NEWSNIGHT's Beth Nissen.
BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thank you. In 1989, a young Princeton University student, Wendy Copp, had an idea -- recruit young college graduates to teach for two years in the neediest public schools, form a kind of domestic Peace Corps for teachers. That corps, called "Teach for America" is now in its 13th year.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(voice-over): July 2002, welcoming ceremonies for the newest corps of Teach for America teachers. Just two weeks ago, they were students at some of the nation's best colleges and universities: Yale, Princeton, University of Michigan, UCLA. They are proven leaders, campus activists, team captains, fraternity presidents, editors of their college papers. It is a highly select group. 14,000 applied to teach this year. 1,700 were accepted. Meet four of them.
MEAGHAN BROWN, PRINCETON GRADUATE: My name is Meaghan Brown. And I went to Princeton University. I was an English major. Freshman year, I was pre-med.
NISSEN: Meaghan Brown applied to Teach for America after hearing a Princeton graduate she knew talk about the rewards of being a corps member.
M. BROWN: I saw myself teaching little people. Third grade definitely was my idea, shorter than me.
NISSEN: That's unlikely. Meaghan will be teaching seventh grade science in the Bronx. Meaghan and three other Teach for American teachers will share an apartment in Manhattan. They already share their versions of the same dream.
M. BROWN: For one student 10 years from now to look back and say yes, Ms. Brown, she's the reason I am where I am now.
MATT KELLY, BROWN UNIV. GRADUATE: My name is Matt Kelly. I just graduated from Brown University with a concentration in Sociology.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly grew up in Haverford, Pennsylvania on the Philadelphia Main Line.
KELLY: I went to private schools my whole education. I feel like because I've been so privileged, I owe it to all the people who have helped me to try and give back in some ways.
NISSEN: Matt has one early concern about being a teacher. He doesn't look the part.
M. BROWN: I'm only 22. I'm not easily recognizable as a teacher. I'm hoping to steal some of my dad's ties.
NISSEN: He chooses ties that are summer weight. Matt will be teaching high school English in the Mississippi Delta.
M. BROWN: Trying to understand the culture there, and trying to become a part of it I think is going to be the greatest challenge to me.
TARINDA WHITE, NORTHWESTERN UNIV. GRADUATE: My name is Tarinda White. I graduated from Northwestern University on June 22nd. Hurray. My major was in Education and Social Policy.
NISSEN: Tarinda was headed for graduate school in Clinical Psychology when she was recruited to Teach for America.
WHITE: There was a professor on my campus who yanked me literally by the arm, and said you have to do this. You have to do this. She said, you know, these children who are left behind in our education systems are predominantly African-American and they're predominantly Hispanic. I said okay, what does me community need right now?
NISSEN: Tarinda will be teaching elementary school in greater Los Angeles. Graduate school will wait.
MICHAEL GARCIA, UNIV. OF MICH. GRADUATE: My name is Michael Garcia and I just graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in Biological Psychology. I grew up in a small town in South Texas, it's called Farr (ph), Texas. It's about 10 minutes north of Mexico. So we're way down south.
NISSEN: Mike Garcia went to poorly funded local public schools, chronically short on teachers, textbooks and desks.
GARCIA: You go into a room that you would you think could only fit 20, 25 people, and they would stick 35, 40 kids in there.
NISSEN: Mike never thought about college until young first-year teachers at his high school changed his thinking and his life.
GARCIA: They pushed me. They pushed, not only me but everybody in the classroom.
NISSEN: And inspired him to apply himself to his studies, then to apply for college. He now wants to do for others what those teachers did for him. Mike will be teaching elementary school in inner city Baltimore, if he can solve his own necktie problems. He's never worn a tie, but a tie is the mark of a professional, a reminder to students of what can be achieved.
GARCIA: Success would mean getting every single, you know, kid in my classroom to realize that education is the key to success.
NISSEN: At opening ceremonies, that message is underscored by Teach for America's founder, Wendy Copp.
WENDY COPP, FOUNDER, TEACH FOR AMERICA: While it is exceedingly difficult to close the achievement gap for your students, though, we do know that it is possible.
NISSEN: Possible but daunting. Most corps members have no formal education training, no teaching experience. They get both in five weeks of teacher boot camp, summer institutes held in Houston and New York. They take seminars in child development, learning disabilities, literacy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's called text-to-text connection. NISSEN: They move quickly from being student to facing students. Corps members teach summer school in the Houston and New York City public schools.
GARCIA: What sound does a "CH" make?
NISSEN: They get exposure to the age group, the academic levels, the behavior and the attitudes of some of the students they'll be teaching in the fall. They teach in teams. They work with students one-on-one.
GARCIA: What letter is it in English? "D." Good, good.
NISSEN: Their teaching is carefully monitored by master teachers. The new corps members make plenty of rookie mistakes. Matt Kelly doesn't bring a watch to the high school English class he's teaching. He loses track of time, drops a key part of his lesson plan. His evaluation lasts almost as long as his class.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You felt the constraints of time. And had you had more time in the class, you would have gotten more response from them.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to go ahead and start because you guys are going to be going to workshops at 1:20.
NISSEN: The days are tightly scheduled. Five weeks go by in a blur of lesson planning, grading papers, making posters, mastering universal teacher sign language. At the end of five weeks, most corps members are both exhausted and exhilarated.
CROWD: We can do it! We can do it!
NISSEN: They can hardly wait to go out and start teaching, start making a difference. Not a one of them has any idea just how hard that's going to be.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Up next on our special, "Teaching for America, we'll see how our teachers make it through their first seven days of teaching. This is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: The new teachers are placed where they're needed most, in 18 inner city and rural areas around the country. They're hired by local school districts. They're paid the starting salary of a first- year teacher. For most that works out to about $30,000 a year. Yet almost all the new teachers are delighted. Their student loans are deferred for the two years they teach, and they have challenging work, hard work, right out of college. They don't know just how challenging it is until their first week on the job.
So here again, Beth Nissen.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARCIA: I want to you listen carefully. A, B, C, D, E, F...
NISSEN: First week of first grade. Mike Garcia starts with the basics, a new improved version of the alphabet song.
GROUP: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z.
GARCIA: Good!
NISSEN: Mike is scrambling to assess his 15 students, how well they know and can write the alphabet and numbers from 1 to 10. Mike notices many of the students write their numbers and letters backwards.
GARCIA: Does a 3 look like that? Yes, it's really confusing, I know. Sometimes it gets hard.
I'm looking for things. You look for things like dyslexia, you know, things like that.
NISSEN: And problems like pencil grip.
GARCIA: There's one girl, Chandria, who holds her pencil like that so I'm going to address that.
NISSEN: If he can get and keep their attention.
GARCIA: Everybody listen up. Quiet coyote. Let me see it.
NISSEN: He uses a trick he learned at summer institute.
GARCIA: Let me see your quiet coyote. I do this and I'm like, you know, When your mouth is closed, your ears are open. And it's funny, because it's a nice cute little saying, but if you catch me at a bad time, I'm just yelling to them like "quiet coyote, quiet coyote."
NISSEN: There are behavior rules in Mr. Garcia's classroom. Violators get two warnings, then a five minute time out in the corner.
GARCIA: I gave you a warning and you did it again. You know what happens after the warning, right? They know I'm not kidding. They know I don't joke around.
NISSEN: That's because the stakes are so high.
GARCIA: Show me what a plus sign looks like.
NISSEN: First grade is the first real academic year. It's when many children learn to read, learn fundamental mathematics.
GARCIA: Is that a plus sign?
GROUP: No! GARCIA: What's this?
GROUP: A plus sign!
GARCIA: A plus sign, right.
NISSEN: Mike tries to keep to his ambitious lesson plan, but it's hard.
GARCIA: How many of you need to go to the restroom?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Me!
GARCIA: You all need to go to the restroom. All right...
NISSEN: He's learned to run the frequent bathroom trips like a drill sergeant.
GARCIA: Okay now, boys, I don't want to have to go in there and see you flushing the toilet again and again. You've been doing it the past two times. If it happens again, we are never going to the bathroom again.
NISSEN: Bathroom dawdling eats up precious class time.
GARCIA: Okay, girls, your time is up! Mr. Garcia's class, let's go. Boys, your time is up. Mr. Garcia's class, let's go.
NISSEN: First grade isn't easy for a first-time teacher.
GARCIA: Can I read you something?
GROUP: No!
GARCIA: Are you pinching him?
NISSEN: His kids act up. His kids cry.
GARCIA: They're little babies. You know, you have to bring in this maternal instinct into it. And you know, I don't think I'm good at it.
I just want to see you with one carpet.
I'm having a hard time. I don't think at this point that I've taught them anything that is of importance. Today is only the fourth day, but I want to see, you know, progress.
WHITE: Shh, quiet, quiet. No more animal noises.
NISSEN: Tarinda White has survived the first week of teaching second grade.
WHITE: I felt like I was in a circus. There was too many things going on at once. I was just like, oh, my gosh. Okay, you go to the restroom. You, go get some water. Here's a pencil. I have 20 students all together and 17 are Hispanic. Their first language is English. My kids can pretty much understand the language, and they can communicate to me in the language.
NISSEN: Regardless of first language, most all her students have scored poorly on early math and reading tests. By fourth grade, children in low-income communities in California are two to three grade levels behind in math, three to four grade levels behind in reading.
After her informal student assessments, Tarinda somewhat encouraged.
WHITE: Out of the 20, I have 18 who I know for sure can read.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At the door of the first little pig.
WHITE: Beyond that, I think I have about 15 who are really strong writers. 15 out of 20.
NISSEN: It's the other five children she's already worried about.
WHITE: Right now, they're still drawing pictures for me. It's a task just to get their name on their paper. I'm worried about them getting further behind because I'm trying to keep up with the pace of the majority of the students. They're saying "I need help, I need help," but I'm trying to make sure everyone is on task.
NISSEN: Tarinda has already identified two barriers to keeping everyone on task. The first is utterly unexpected.
WHITE: Do you have a pencil? Do you have a pencil? They're not sharpened? Pencils! Pencils take up so much time. I need to sharpen my pencil. I lost my pencil. Can I borrow a pencil? Oh, my pencil is not as sharp as her pencil. Pencils are driving me crazy.
NISSEN: Her other challenge -- Maurice.
WHITE: Maurice, no, no, no, in line. Give it to me until the end of the day. Maurice, you have three seconds to come over here and sit down. Crystal and Maurice, you're going to be partners, okay?
MAURICE: No.
WHITE: Yes. Shh!
NISSEN: When Tarinda can get Maurice to focus, he learns.
WHITE: All right! Give me a high five. That was good.
NISSEN: But keeping him focused, keeping him upright, isn't easy.
WHITE: What makes someone a best friend?
NISSEN: Tarinda works to keep herself focused on her goals for her class.
WHITE: By Halloween, I want my students writing paragraphs. Like I want each and every one of them to be able to express every single thing they want in writing.
NISSEN: No exceptions. Same goal for every last one of her students.
M. BROWN: Ladies and gentlemen, folks, the answer that was on the board was correct.
NISSEN: It's been a rough start for Meaghan Brown, the seventh grade science teacher in the Bronx.
M. BROWN: I'm going to wait until I have quiet in this room and then we're going to do a really fun experiment.
These have conceivably been the seven most miserable days of my life. I really feel like I have zero control over any of my students. They're just all over the place, out of their seat, out of the room, constantly talking. During the summer, I was teaching a class of somewhere between 12 and 18, and now have I between 25 and 30.
Rolando, Akim, Shatara.
So my class has doubled in size and quadrupled in management issues at least. This morning it was sort of like why am I doing this?
NISSEN: She isn't even doing what she'd prepared for.
M. BROWN: And our four is in the seventh place?
NISSEN: On the second day of school, Meaghan was told she'd be teaching math, as well as science.
M. BROWN: Think of it as a Pacman...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eating.
M. BROWN: ...or an alligator eating. You're always going to eat the bigger number.
NISSEN: A few of her students are up to grade level, but more than two-thirds of New York City's middle school students failed the state's math exam last year.
M. BROWN: The fact is that a lot of my students have gaps from the fourth, fifth and sixth grade that need to be filled before we can get started on the real seventh grade material.
NISSEN: At least she has math textbooks.
M. BROWN: It's taken me a week and a half to get books for all my class, but I have a full set of math books and half a set of science books. What did you guys infer?
NISSEN: Teaching science, physics, and chemistry is a challenge for other reasons.
M. BROWN: My classroom has no running water. In fact, my entire floor has no running water right now. I may actually ask my students to do experiments at home for homework.
M. BROWN: Everyone has their homework sheet?
GROUP: Yes.
NISSEN: If she can get them to do homework. She's already concerned about homework, tardiness, attendance.
M. BROWN: There are four students I have never seen.
NISSEN: Meaghan has asked her students to write out their long term goals. Most want to get through middle school, pass eighth grade. Only a few have higher aspirations. Meaghan worries that those goals are at risk if she can't get control of her classroom.
M. BROWN: Tina, you need to sit down. Jimmy. Shikira, that's enough.
SHIKIRA: I don't care. She's pushing at me.
M. BROWN: They can see that their classmates are out of their seats and not paying attention and not on task. It prevents them from being highly motivated to get work done, because they feel like no one in the class is getting anything done, so why should they be working? I feel so completely helpless. I don't feel like I have any clue of what I'm doing or any control or any direction. I just hope when I finally do gain control of my classroom, it's not too late.
KELLY: When the bell goes, it should be quiet. You're going to write for 10 minutes. It's 11:49 by my watch right now.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly now has a watch. He needs it to keep his six 11th grade English classes on time.
KELLY: I have about 130 students, depending upon how many show up. Most of my classes are listed at between say 23 and 28 students, but usually slightly over 20 show up.
NISSEN: After one week, he has a rough assessment of his students' writing and reading skills.
KELLY: Out of my 130 students, I would say about 30 to 35 are reading and writing at their grade level. And that might be a highest estimate.
Start correcting these sentences.
NISSEN: Most write poorly. KELLY: Subject/verb agreement doesn't really mean much to a lot of kids. Possessives is kind of out the window. The big problem is that they write like they speak. They don't know the difference between doing and during because in -- with a southern accent, it kind of sounds the same.
NISSEN: The Delta accent, compounded by local teen speak and universal teen mumble is a problem for Matt.
KELLY: The first couple days I'd say I'm sorry I didn't hear you, there was too much noise. Or I'd try and make up an excuse for them to repeat it. And they'd say it again and I still wouldn't get it.
NISSEN: Matt is supposed to be teaching American literature, but only a few of his students read well enough to manage a novel. Even if they did, the school doesn't have enough copies of any one novel for 130 students.
KELLY: I can't give a kid a book and say, "Take this home and read 20 pages," because we only have 30 books.
NISSEN: To encourage his kids to read, Matt has stocked a classroom bookcase with popular paperbacks he's brought from home.
KELLY: Over here, I've got the shelf set up. There's some Stephen King books, some "S-files" books.
Kids, like after class, will come by and say, Mr. Kelly, can I take a book? I'm like, yes, please take the book. Read something.
NISSEN: Matt tries hard to make class and homework fun, so his students will show up, will stay in school. He had hoped there would be a few students he could coax, coach towards college. If they're in his classes, he hasn't found them yet.
KELLY: Shh!! Listen up.
A lot of the kids that I get by 11th grade have been really turned off by education. They're just trying to get through. In a lot of ways, they've been pushed through the system. They're very far behind.
I'll see you all Friday.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Coming up next, going above and beyond what the job requires. Our "Teaching for America" special continues on NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: It comes up almost every time teachers anywhere ask for more pay. Someone will make the argument that teachers have it very easy, they get their entire summers off, they get holidays off, and, by the way, they only work from eight to three. Not so, it turns out, as every Teach For America teacher can tell you.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A teacher's day starts early.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've been getting up between 5:30 and 5:45 every morning. It takes me 40 minutes to get to school in the morning. I'm at school between 7:00 and 7:15.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get out breakfast and then try and get to school around 7:00. Get everything together, if I have handouts.
WENDY KOPP, PRESIDENT/FOUNDER, TEACH FOR AMERICA: If you're a teacher in one of these schools, in order to be successful, you are going to have to go way above and beyond what our society thinks of as a teacher's job.
NISSEN: Matt Kelly starts teaching an hour before school starts, working one on one with students who need extra help.
KELLY: But it's in three words, so you know it's a prepositional phrase.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can we all please stand for the pledge? I pledge allegiance to the flag...
NISSEN: But the school day usually starts around 8:00 a.m.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five, four, three, two, one, thank you.
The whole day is just go, go, go, go because I don't want to cheat my kids out of a good education.
NISSEN: Most teachers are on their feet for the next seven hours, doing their best to teach.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do all animals have the same kind of covering?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, they don't.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Velocity is just a fancy word for speed.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: When you write a letter, you need to have the date.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And what is a thesis statement?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: It's the main idea.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When do you feel more resistance from the air, when you're going really, really slow or really, really fast?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Please, raise your hand.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jimmy! Andrea!
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: What?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do not, do not, do not use your fingers because once we start adding bigger numbers, you don't have enough fingers to count that many numbers.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What operation could you do between these to make it a smaller fraction?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many are covered by skin.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're almost in there. It's just like from a big wave, tropical.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right, the bell is about to go. I'll be here after school if you want to go over three paragraph essays or anything else.
NISSEN: School is out around 3:00, but most Teach For America teachers still have hours of work to do. Matt Kelly tutors after school, too. Tarinda White stays late to work with Vivian, who is lagging behind her second grade classmates.
WHITE: Vivian, she's reading on kindergarten level. So I give her a full hour after school.
What next there?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WHITE: That's OK. You do it, it's OK.
KOPP: They're maximizing every minute of the school day to move their kids from Point A to Point B and then they're not stopping with the constraints of the school day. You know, when they need more time, they figure out a way to get their kids there early, how to get them to stay late. They know kids in low income communities, when they're given the opportunities they deserve, absolutely can achieve at high levels.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: They reach home. Give me high five.
WHITE: Good job. I am so proud of you.
NISSEN: They regularly work 10 and 12 hour days. Their principals say Teach For America teachers are often the last to leave school at the end of the day. Many go from school to school, take evening classes in education towards master's degrees and teacher certification.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And then they've got something to take home with them.
NISSEN: When teachers do get home, their work day isn't over. There are phone calls to make to students' parents.
M. BROWN: Hi, this is Megan Brown. I'm Victoria's teacher. Did she tell you she has a math test tomorrow?
This is Miss. Brown. I'm Gary's teacher.
Today, the chatting was out of control.
This is Miss. Brown. I'm Tershel's (ph) teacher. I just wanted to make sure Tershel was all right since she wasn't at school today. No.
NISSEN: And then they have their own homework to do, reviewing student performance, grading papers, grading papers, grading papers. Ahead of them, the next school day, the next chance to teach.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: Still to come on NEWSNIGHT, we'll have more of our special look at Teach For America.
But first a short break and a news update.
COMMERCIAL
BROWN: We're going to continue with our NEWSNIGHT special, Teaching For America.
We've been following the lives of four young people as they spend their first year teaching. We've watched their training. We've seen their first few weeks with students.
And joining us again to continue telling their story is CNN's Beth Nissen. BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, each semester, the rookie Teach For America teachers have come to know their students' academic strengths and weaknesses. They have also learned a great deal about their students' lives outside school and how profoundly that can affect their work in school.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NISSEN (voice-over): By late October, a few of Mike Garcia's first graders are reading and writing. Many are blending alphabet sounds into words.
GARCIA: Five. Five.
NISSEN: The students can do simple math, minus one, adding.
GARCIA: He skips numbers. He can't add, he can't subtract.
NISSEN: Mike wants Allen (ph) evaluated for learning disabilities, for lead poisoning.
GARCIA: It's definitely prevalent in my classroom that most students in this school, you know, have been exposed to lead poisoning.
NISSEN: They're exposed to much more in the low income, high crime neighborhoods of West Baltimore that Mike says affects them in school.
GARCIA: Who wants to learn their ABCs when you're hungry? I mean who wants to, you know, learn about adding when, you know, you saw your cousin shot to death right in front of you or you saw so and so get shot, you know, last night?
NISSEN: Mike tries to make his classroom a clean and cozy haven. He brings in a table full of food for the class Halloween party.
GARCIA: Who's never had pumpkin pie? I want you to try your best to follow with your finger.
NISSEN: In November, Mike's students take their first standardized test. Mike is stunned by the results.
GARCIA: My kids, as a class, scored a seven percent out of 100 percent. It's pretty stressful, you know, on my part to try to find out what's wrong and what I can do to change it.
Now, that's the problem.
NISSEN: Mike revises his lesson plans, tries again.
GARCIA: Now, I need you to go to page 160.
NISSEN: Two weeks before Christmas, he thinks he sees some small progress in math, reading and a breakthrough in a writing assignment.
GARCIA: Each kid did three or four sentences. Each kid was obviously trying their hardest to spell words and I just had one of those moments where I smiled and thought oh, OK. I guess they are getting something.
I personally believe that my kids will do a lot better in the future. I think they're going to surprise a lot of people with their next tests. They are some really good things going on in this classroom.
NISSEN: Just blocks from the Linwood, California school where Turunda White is teaching, a sidewalk shrine for a man killed in a drive-by shooting the night before. Just across the street from the school, police make an arrest. A recent police manhunt put Turunda's second grade class into lockdown.
WHITE: They were scared. They were like oh, Miss. White, they're going to start shooting. We should get down on the floor. We should get under our desks.
NISSEN: Turunda knows some of her students live in rough neighborhoods, have tough lives.
WHITE: I have students who are homeless. I have students whose fathers are in prison. I have students who have never seen their fathers.
NISSEN: Yet she sets equally high goals for all her second graders, no exceptions, no excuses. She wants them all reading at third grade level by the end of second grade.
WHITE: You have to expect the best from them. I have a chance to catch the students now before they fall through the cracks.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: And he went on the floor for his last (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
WHITE: Good. Good reading.
NISSEN: By late November, five of her students are reading above grade level.
WHITE: Now, you're going to look through the story for all of the words that have the long I sound.
NISSEN: The rest are learning quickly. Vivian has made marked progress.
WHITE: She's getting Cs now on her spelling where she could not even form a word before.
NISSEN: As for Maurice, Turunda has discovered the power of the shrewd seating plan.
WHITE: He's at a table with all girls who are really serious about learning and they make sure he stays on path.
Give me your best handwriting.
NISSEN: Turunda has been teaching for only four months, but she sees the difference she's made.
WHITE: When they say hey, that's a noun, that's a common noun, that's a proper noun, I feel like, wow, I taught them that.
And I look at myself in the mirror and I say I'm a teacher. I am a teacher.
NISSEN: She looks at her students and sees 20 reasons to be a teacher.
WHITE: I am doing my best so that these students do get a fair chance, so they do get an equal opportunity and I'm helping to give that by giving them a quality education.
MEGAN BROWN: Who can tell me what it's called?
NISSEN: Megan Brown is now teaching seventh grade English in addition to science and math. Most of her 28 students are struggling.
BROWN: Is it really tough? Bingo. Five or six students are failing all three subjects that I teach, English, math and science. And about two thirds of the class are failing at least one subject.
NISSEN: Megan says she, too, is failing.
BROWN: My number one failure is classroom management, just the ability to keep them quiet or at least on path. I can't get them to show me or each other respect in the classroom.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: You guys ain't watching no lesson. Nobody's listening.
BROWN: I just feel like, like they're losing an entire year, and that's my responsibility.
NISSEN: Megan finds small comfort in those few students who are listening, are learning.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: You put the one on the bottom and the two on the top.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Yes, you put the one on the bottom and the two on the top.
BROWN: Those five or six students who are learning are not learning as much as they should be because they're being distracted and the class is being distracted by the other 25.
I'm leaving.
NISSEN: Megan says the problem is her lack of experience.
BROWN: I know that there are teachers who could come in here and have them be quiet and have them do their work. I've seen it. There are teachers in this building who can do it.
I'm waiting still.
I think that if I were a little more experienced, I could handle them all better.
NISSEN: Megan has been promised help after the holiday break, regular coaching by experienced teachers. In the meantime, she learns what she can, teaches what she can day by day.
BROWN: Guys, straight and quiet. I am not kidding.
NISSEN: It is the morning of the nine weeks test for Matt Kelly's eleventh grade English classes. Matt does all he can to spike up his students.
KELLY: Come on, it's the nine weeks test. There we go.
NISSEN: The test is a practice for the Arkansas standardized tests in the spring. Students are tested on reading comprehension, identifying parts of speech. They have to write a three paragraph essay, which Matt has been drilling them on since September.
KELLY: My students are in eleventh grade and some of them have never written a three paragraph essay. They don't really know how to do it.
NISSEN: Students take the test in late October. Matt has their scores by December.
KELLY: The results of the nine weeks test were pretty disappointing. There were eight multiple choice questions. Most kids got between four and six questions right. Most of my eleventh grade students are reading on a seventh or eighth grade level.
NISSEN: Matt steps up his efforts, starts his students reading a play he thinks they can relate to, August Wilson's (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
KELLY: All I wanted them to do was change the job description, give everybody a chance to drive a truck.
NISSEN: The play engages his students in class, but most just don't see the relevance of literature and essays and grammar to their lives outside school.
KELLY: A body at rest stays at rest and Helen has been at rest for a while. A lot of them, their goal is just to graduate and move away.
NISSEN: Matt has already lost one student, Rico, before graduation. Matt had confronted Rico about not doing assignments, cutting class.
KELLY: It turned out that his dad's on drugs, he ends up meeting a girl and moving in with her and her child into the projects in Helena.
NISSEN: Rico left school a month ago. Matt still has his last assignment.
KELLY: They had to make a coat of arms for themself and this is the one Rico made, which is him at a graduation podium. They have the same dreams as everybody else, but no one's giving them the chance to fulfill those dreams. I guess we've made some progress, but it's just, the idea of equal education is just so far away.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COMMERCIAL
BROWN: Placing energetic and committed young teachers in some of the nation's neediest schools is only part of the Teach For America mission. The other part is marshalling the energies and firsthand experience of former Teach For America teachers after their two year commitments in the classroom.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDREW WARREN, Teacher: All right, to be or not to be?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: That is the question.
NISSEN (voice-over): Teach For America now has more than 6,000 alumni. Sixty percent of them still work in education. Andrew Warren teaches just across the hall from Matt Kelly in Helena, Arkansas. He finished his Teach For America commitment last year, but stayed on.
Just across town, former Corps member Scott Shirey (ph) is the director of a new charter school.
SCOTT SHIREY: You know, the trick is how do you broaden your sphere of influence so you can reach more students, reach more lives, have a greater impact?
KOPPP: When we talk about reaching the day when all kids have the chance to attain an excellent education, what we're really talking about is massive systematic change.
NISSEN: Change from within.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Talk to your class, OK?
NISSEN: Former Corps members are now working as school administrators. Nicole Soloman (ph) is principal of Ralph Bunche Elementary School in Compton, California.
NICOLE SOLOMAN, TEACHER: Let's hear the motto on three. One, two, three.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Ree (ph), ree, ree.
SOLOMAN: And in Spanish?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Rah, rah, rah.
SOLOMAN: OK, have a beautiful day, Ting and Wendy, and thank you.
JULIE MACOUDA, SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER: All those in favor, please show by raising your hands.
NISSEN: Julie Macouda is helping shape education policy in Washington, D.C. as a member of the school board.
MACOUDA: It passes unanimously.
NISSEN: The nation's top education leaders are impressed.
ROD PAIGE, U.S. SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: The Teach For America spirit expands outside the classroom into the other parts of the community that influence the environment where students learn and where teachers teach.
NISSEN: Former Corps members such as Chicago pediatrician Sarah Van Orman (ph) are working to improve the health of low income children.
SARAH VAN ORMAN, PEDIATRICAIN: It's the runny nose, the coughing, and that that triggers the asthma.
NISSEN: Mark Levine opened a credit union in the New York City neighborhood where he was a Teach For America teacher.
MARK LEVINE, FOUNDER, CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE: We've made loans to families who have got their first home computers. We've had families who have called us to pay for a college education. If we want every child to have an equal chance in life, we have to address education, but also we have to make sure that they're well fed, they receive good health care, that their folks have a good job, that they have good housing.
KOPPP: There is so much more to be done and it's that that's fueling our sense of urgency to say we have to take this to a higher level, we have to grow this effort.
NISSEN: Teach For America has 2,500 teachers now in classrooms. Within three years, it hopes to have 4,000, helping students achieve.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a gigantic task, but you start with one student at a time. And if you can impact one student, you can impact two students. And if you can impact two students, you can impact four.
NISSEN: And can, over time, have a profound impact on what millions of the nation's children learn and what kind of chance they will have in life.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NISSEN: This project took the hard work of four principal camera crews over six months and they deserve thanks by name. In Los Angeles, Tom Larsen (ph) and Jim Fallen (ph). In Helena, Arkansas, Jerry Hatton (ph) and Tracy Duncan (ph). In Baltimore, Reggie Fenlah (ph) and Elizabeth Zofo (ph). And in New York, Fred Shang (ph) and Roy McClain (ph). Our gifted editor was Alamah Duglas (ph).
But our primary thanks go to Megan Brown, Mike Garcia, Matt Kelly and Turunda White for letting us into their classrooms, for sharing their small triumphs and continuing struggles.
BROWN: And our thanks to you for sharing it all with us on this holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT.
Thanks for joining us.
I'm Aaron Brown.
We'll see you soon.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
AARON BROWN, HOST: Good evening again. I'm Aaron Brown and we're bringing you this special holiday edition of NEWSNIGHT through the miracle of videotape. I'm off with my family tonight. We hope you're with your family as well. And wherever you are, we wish you the best in this holiday season.
Tonight, we devote the program to a group of people who truly are, one by one, changing lives. They are not the people you might expect. We hear every day about the scientist who cures a disease, or the firefighter who saves a life, or perhaps the leader who steps forward. On one level tonight's program is about nothing as grand ass that. In another way, there is nothing more important. It is about who inspires the future leader, who first gets the scientist interested in the science. And it's about planting those seeds in some pretty barren soil.
We focus tonight on people who are committing two years of their lives to teach, not in the country's best schools either. At a time when many of their peers are going on to law school or getting their MBAs instead, they're working with kids, kids who deal with a lot of adversity in life. Perhaps the cruelest of all being low expectations.
Tonight's edition of NEWSNIGHT is called "Teaching for America>
