TEACH Impact Story: Alejandro

My name is Alejandro. I am currently working as a Paraprofessional at Stedman Elementary School and the TEACH Scholarship has been an incredible support for my career. It has allowed me to be in the ECE undergraduate program at Community College of Aurora, and in these first months I have taken advantage of classes in children’s literature, psychology, geography—all of which have had an immediate impact on my skills and knowledge as an assistant teacher. Specifically, it has given me the tools to choose books that are more in line with my students, choose more culturally relevant content and use these books with more capacity to improve the results for my students. My geography course has revealed so much about the customs and culture of my students– children of parents from other countries—and this along with my coursework in DPP has empowered me to leverage the multicultural environment that allows for the proper development of students and parents. Finally, psychology has given me opportunities to get to know myself more deeply, and to organize my goals that I pursue as a teacher and facilitator of children’s education. I have been amazed at the things I have learned and cannot wait to find out everything I will learn in the future to offer my students. I am very grateful to the TEACH Scholarship that is giving me the opportunity to prepare, and I wish to continue counting on your support in my academic growth to share it with the children.

– Alejandro, TEACH Scholar