Mostly first generation Asian and Central American, the bilingual students I was assigned to tutor at Galileo High School were simultaneously straddling two or more cultures while struggling with the normal pressures of being teenagers. Our job as volunteers in the AVID program was to assist their teacher—a kind, devoted young white woman to whom they were fiercely loyal—in helping them surmount the barriers to higher education due to their inability to express themselves adequately in English. The culmination of the pre-college program—their essay—was the final product that would possibly be reviewed in their applications; for some it was what might distinguish them for advancement to state or community college where they could help their families rise above menial labor, which many of the kids did each day after school when they should have been studying.

The second week, having thought since about what we could realistically expect, I returned to Galileo with a view that whether or not these students succeeded in getting admitted to college one year hence was beyond my ability to influence, but what I could contribute was a degree of confidence in their worth and potential, a desire to write better, and a joy of learning to do so.

–Jay Taber