Teach For America selects Estevez

Elsy Estevez, who graduated from Wheaton College with honors in May, knows a lot about the impact a caring and innovative teacher can have early on in a child's life.

In 1994, she emigrated from the Dominican Republic to the United States. Initially she struggled to adapt and learn English. Her salvation came in the form of elementary school teachers who helped her.

"My third grade teacher was incredibly influential, reached out to my family, and used her bilingual skills to make me feel comfortable enough to want to learn," Estevez said.

Now Estevez is in the position to do the same. The Queens, N.Y., resident has been chosen to join Teach For America, which recruits outstanding recent college graduates and working professionals to teach in urban and rural public schools. This year the corps received a record 35,000 applications from graduating seniors, postgraduates and professionals.

The Teach For America corps trains and provides ongoing support to candidates from all backgrounds and career interests to help them successfully teach in low-income communities. Corps members commit to teach for at least two years. The goal, according to Teach for America Web site, is to eliminate educational equities by enlisting help of the nation's future leaders.

Estevez, a double major in international relations and Italian Studies, was a senior class officer and Posse Scholar. She will begin teaching third grade in September in a new elementary school in Newark, N.J.

Third grade continues to hold a special place in her heart because of the teachers. "By challenging me and caring about the progress I made, my teachers helped me build the confidence and academic skills that I desperately needed in order to move on from bilingual classes," she wrote in her Teach For America application essay. "To this day, I still very fondly remember the names of those teachers, and I am certain that this is the type of impact I would like to have on students in similar situations today."

Her time at Wheaton has taught her valuable lessons that she hopes to pass on. "At Wheaton, I was exposed to people who had very different experiences and because of it I have learned more about myself," she said. "I would like to share this with my students and create a classroom atmosphere that is welcoming and accepting of differences. I expect that most of my students will identify as either African American or Latino, many of whom have never left Newark. I will encourage them to explore outside of their boundaries but always bring their experiences and talent back home to a city that has been deprived for many decades."

This fall, about 4,100 new corps members will start teaching in schools across the nation. The other Wheaton students who will be among them are: Sarah Mielbye '09 of Attleboro, Mass., who will teach in Connecticut, and Kristine Vilagie '09 of Carver, Mass., who will head to Phoenix, Arizona.