Jeenah Park teaches biology full time at Locke High School in downtown Los Angeles.
A student in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies’ Teacher Education Program, she also received her bachelor’s degree at UCLA in the spring.
As part of the Social Justice Agenda, Park teaches at one of the program’s 12 participating high schools that serves underrepresented communities.
In the 2004-2005 school year, the graduation rate at Locke High School was 38 percent, with an enrollment of about 3,000 students.
A majority of students from Locke High School are underrepresented minorities, which represented 22.6 percent of the applications and about 4 percent of admitted students for fall 2007 admissions, according to university records.
Park said she tells her students that her efforts are in their best interests.
“I would rather be a really, really strict teacher … than have (them) fail out of class and drop out of school,” she said.
But she said she still struggles to reach out to all her students.
“There are some kids who pretend to listen and just forget about it the next day,” she said.
She is one of many students, who following the completion of their undergraduate work, go into education to bridge the achievement gap between affluent and poor students.
“It’s a lot easier to utilize the resources … when you are born with it, when you are easily able to take advantage of it,” Park said.
Sheila Lane, faculty adviser for the 11-year-old Teacher Education Program said it is highly competitive, with 450 applicants for 150 spots.
She said applicants come from different schools, but many UCLA students who apply for admissions tend to be actively involved in community service on campus, such as BruinCorps and other service-oriented student groups.
“We’re interested in long-term reform of the urban school,” Lane said. “We have a lot of people who are very committed and want to make a difference.”
UCLA’s Teacher Education Program is one of many programs offered nationwide, such as Teach for America.
Part of AmeriCorps, Teach for America is a program in which participants spend two years teaching in low-income urban and rural communities.
“This can be a focus for everyone, and it’s a solvable issue,” said Conor Leonard, recruiting director for Teach for America.
Leonard, who previously taught civics in a high school in Charlotte, N.C., said the disparities in education are feasible obstacles for motivated students to overcome.
He added that he believes the achievement gap comes from the unmet needs of people in low-income communities and the failure of society of make such issues a national priority.
Until society addresses issues such as inadequate housing, health care and preschool opportunities, he said “the cycle continues.”
But whether a student attends a high school with plenty of resources or none, Park said there are some students who define themselves in terms of achievement.
“I think what really sets them apart is that they set goals and they have clear, attainable, definite goals,” she said.
But Lane said the educational system has failed some students.
“Something’s wrong with the system if you have a very high dropout rate of the students,” she said.
She added that a lack of certified teachers is a significant obstacle in preparing high school students in low-income communities for college admissions. “One of the big things is getting qualified science and math and English teachers into the classrooms,” she said. “If these kids don’t have qualified … teachers, how do they compete?”
Lane said she once spoke to a group of students who had to retake an algebra class in high school because their school would not give credit for their middle school course, which was taught by seven substitute teachers during the year.
She added that some schools will hire half, if not more, of their science and math departments from students in the Teacher Education Program.
Lane said the relationships developed between the school administrators and program officials have created fruitful results.
When John H. Liechty Middle School opened this fall, she said the principal hired 23 first-year students ““ a third of their faculty.
Gabe Rose, president of the Undergraduate Students Association Council, said he plans on applying for Teach for America because he said he believes that society needs to recognize the extent of the problems in education.
“It’s just a stark contrast: a mad rush of people driving themselves crazy, and in another segment, college is just not a focus,” he said.
He said programs like Teach for America are not a sufficient solution.
“While getting good teachers in classes is important and getting the right resources in the classroom is necessary … (we) need to see a change in culture in those communities,” Rose said.
Lane said Teach for America operates with a different philosophy from that of the UCLA’s Teacher Education Program.
“It’s just a really (good) recruiting program that places people into the schools, but they have very different kind of training and different kind of support,” she said.
“It’s different, it doesn’t have a long range view,” she said.
She added that Teach for America does not offer its participants teacher certification; instead they must be in intern programs affiliated with universities.
The UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies offers an intern program called TeachLA.
“We’re looking for retention … not just people who are dabbling, who think it would be fun to see what it’s like for a year or two,” she said.
Both programs are currently in the process of recruiting applicants.