Eighth Grade Mathematics Teacher 

Becoming a teacher has always been a dream of mine. As a little girl I would pretend my dolls were my students and I was their teacher. I would teach them math and read to them like they were real people. The amazing teachers who taught me are what eventually inspired me to become a teacher. The love, patience and compassion they showed us led me to the path to pursue my dream of teaching. The love I have for kids and wanting to be an inspiration to them is another factor that influenced me to become a teacher. Teaching in the community I grew up in allowed me to show my students that inner city kids could do more than sports. I wanted my students to see that someone who looks like them and who came from their community became a teacher. Inspiring students to become better versions of themselves is my way of paying forward the encouragement I received when I was child from my teachers. The love I have for learning and wanting to see kids excel in life is another factor that influenced me to teach. My soul feels pure joy when my former students become successful adults. I became a teacher to love, inspire and teach kids that they can achieve greatness.

My belief and personal feelings about teaching is that teaching can be a rewarding but challenging profession. Teaching is a profession that requires patience, compassion, empathy, and love. I am an outstanding teacher because I teach with love and inspire my students by telling them they have “GREATNESS”. I ensure that my students are connected to the world around them by discussing current events and incorporating real world situations into our classroom experiences. Inspiring my students by telling them they have “GREATNESS” makes me an outstanding teacher. On the first day of school, I teach my students about greatness. I inform them that they have greatness inside of them and greatness is expected in the classroom. We discuss why they have greatness and what it takes to display those qualities in the classroom. We discuss positive attributes of our classmates and show love and kindness to one another. Students begin to think about themselves differently and are inspired to achieve “GREATNESS” in the classroom. Teaching this lesson on “GREATNESS” allows all students of diverse backgrounds and abilities to be able to look at themselves in a positive way. To be inclusive and recognize that all my students do not speak English, I also looked up the word “GREATNESS” in Spanish. I encourage my bilingual students by telling them “GRANDEZA”. Outstanding teachers motivate all students even if they do not speak the native language of their students.

School Counselor 

My road to becoming a school counselor was paved by my parents’ sacrifice, my loving and compassionate teachers, and the sanctuary city that raised me. As a first-generation daughter to Portuguese immigrants, the value of education was instilled in me early and eagerly. My parents navigated their new “home” as undocumented immigrants and quickly came to understand that this country’s promise of opportunity did not come without red tape. From a young age, I saw school as a second home, filled with the same love and lessons that comforted me in my own house. I was fortunate to have had the most generous and genuine teachers throughout my twelve-year journey in Elizabeth Public Schools. From the wonderfully wacky word walls of Mrs. Macfarlane’s Kindergarten classroom at Robert Morris School No. 18 to the ultimate test of dedication and drive of Ms. Abdel-Hadi’s senior-year AP Biology class at the “Upper Academy,” I knew I wanted to feel this hopeful every day. It wasn’t until I graduated college that I understood the power that connection beyond a curriculum had on student experience, and I wanted to be a part of that. The master’s in counseling program at Kean University solidified this feeling and there was no doubt in my mind that it was time to give back to my city’s schools and students.

My responsibilities as a school counselor are grounded in supporting holistic student growth and promoting positive climate and culture throughout the building. On paper, my responsibilities can be summed up with a generic social-emotional-academic model. Any school counselor will tell you that we do it all. We are goal setting, lesson-giving, peer-mediating, emotion-managing, future-planning, tear-wiping, hope-restoring superheroes with fidget toys in our capes. When I received my master’s in counseling, I made it my personal and professional mission to especially be an out and active advocate for the LGBTQ+ students and youth of my city. LGBTQ+ youth face countless barriers to a safe and equitable education including higher victimization and discrimination rates that ultimately lead to lower attendance, lower GPA’s, lower self-esteem, and higher levels of depression. Studies show that supportive staff and policy directly enables LGBTQ+ students to feel safer in school, attend school more often, perform better academically, be more likely to pursue post-secondary education, and report feeling higher levels of self-esteem, lower levels of depression, and lower likelihood of having seriously considered suicide in the past year (GLSEN, 2021 National School Climate Survey). Promoting a safe space for all Benjamin Franklin students, with an emphasis on acceptance, respect, communication, and empathy for all students’ stories has proven to increase student-staff morale, family collaboration, and student safety. In the words of one of my eighth graders: “You remove obstacles in the learning course in our heads and let us learn further with a positive state of mind.”