在线英语听力室

外国人帮助我们填补教学位置

时间:2019-10-30 19:04:52

搜索关注在线英语听力室公众号:tingroom,领取免费英语资料大礼包。

(单词翻译)

The New Mexico high desert is known for its beauty. The area enjoys sunny skies, and even snow in winter.

One thing missing has been teachers.

The Aztec Municipal School District serves about 3,000 students in northwestern New Mexico. But, for nearly eight years, the school district had trouble finding full-time1 teachers for its special education students. It instead used temporary or substitute teachers to work with children who have physical disabilities or difficulty learning.

Tania Prokop is Aztec’s Deputy Superintendent2. She tells VOA Americans were not interested in the full-time positions.

Aztec is not alone. New Mexico State University reported that the state had 740 unfilled teaching positions in public schools.

A study from the Learning Policy Institute estimates that nationwide, public school districts currently have a shortage of 112,000 teachers.

This year, through a program that brings foreigners to teach in U.S. schools, Aztec has eight full-time, special education teachers. All of them are Filipinos with J1 visas from the U.S. State Department. They teach some of the children who attend the district’s six schools.

Aztec’s Filipino teachers are trained specialists in their areas of expertise3. They come to teach for three years, and the visa can be extended for up to five years. The J1 visa, however, does not lead to a green card, or permanent residency in the United States.

Prokop gives high marks to the Filipino teachers, saying it has been “a wonderful experience.”

Not all of it has been easy.

Different cultures

Both the Filipino teachers and the American students have to get used to the differences in their cultures. Prokop says managing the classroom is “one of the biggest things” the teachers have had to learn.

Learning in the classroom is not just limited to reading books and doing homework.

Prokop said that many of the students have never traveled far from home.

“So to have somebody come from a whole different country across an ocean and share those experiences and share pictures and share stories and share food and we're coming up to some holidays. So they'll be sharing some different experiences with holidays.”

Treated like family

Prokop said the community welcomed the eight Filipino teachers and helped them settle into their new homes.

Riva Alipin is one of the eight. She teaches mathematics — integrated Algebra4 — at Aztec High School with another teacher.

“Working in America is a dream of every Filipino teacher,” she told VOA. She said she believes America provides an “excellent” chance for them to improve their teaching.

Coming here to teach in America, she said, she needed "a lot of guts5.” In other words, one must be brave. Alipin also said it was “risky” because New Mexico is so far away from her homeland.

Worried about discrimination

She also was concerned about discrimination.

“There has been news in my country that Filipino teachers have been taken for granted, not by the school admin (leaders) but by the students,” she said.

“The students have bullied6 teachers for being a non-native English speaker. Filipinos are discriminated7 because of our accent” — meaning, the way they talk. But she said that, “my experience in Aztec High school proves it wrong.”

She says the students are kind and respectful.

How the U.S. is different

Some things the Filipino teachers will need to get used to; the food and weather. Americans eat different foods. In addition, New Mexico has very different weather from The Philippines. The eight teachers are excited about winter, since it will be their first snow.

Alipin found her job through a business called Bepauche International LLC.

Cheryl Marie Maghinay is co-owner of the company. She left The Philippines and moved to the United States over 10 years ago to accept a job as a teacher. In 2016, she launched her company to help other Filipino teachers find work. This year she helped place teachers in schools across the country, from Florida to Montana and Colorado.

Bepauche is based in Farmington, New Mexico, where Maghinay was a high school teacher. She told VOA almost 1,000 teachers a year contact the company. Of that number, 100 to 200 find jobs in U.S. schools.

Maghinay works with the teachers before they start in their new positions. She said it is not easy for them when they first arrive.

But she adds that the foreign teacher program increases understanding between people from different countries.

“I see the benefits and I see the beauty in diversity. You know, different people come together and learn together. Different practices and also knowledge about each other's culture. It's really, it's really nice.”

More than 3,000 teachers given visas

The U.S. State Department says 3,252 foreign teachers were given exchange visas in 2018. The countries sending the most teachers were the Philippines, Spain, Jamaica, China and France. The top five states with the most foreign teachers were North and South Carolina, New Mexico, Texas and California.

In Illinois, 138 teachers from Spain work in public schools under the visitor exchange program. The state has been taking part in the program for 22 years.

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) told VOA it plans to hire an International Teacher Recruitment Specialist “who will be responsible for establishing relationships with other countries.”

In an email to VOA, Jackie Matthews, an official with the ISBE, said the goal is to employ teachers who speak English and can “teach in areas of need.” But, she called it a “short-term solution while ISBE continues to support ‘grow our own’ teacher programs.”

What is causing the shortage of teachers?

Matthews said Americans give different reasons, including pay, pensions and working conditions. The ISBE says another problem is that educators are not always being prepared to teach subjects where there is the highest demand in U.S. schools. Illinois’ biggest shortages are in bilingual and special education.

I'm Bryan Lynn.

And I’m Anne Ball.

Words in This Story

district – n. an area or section of a country, city, or town: such as an area established by a government for official government business

superintendent – n. a person who directs or manages a place, department, organization

residency – n. the state or fact of living in a place

manage – v. to have control of (something, such as a business, department, sports team)

take for granted – v. to fail to properly notice or appreciate (someone or something that is helpful or important to you)

bully8 – v. to frighten, hurt, or threaten (a smaller or weaker person) : to act like a bully toward (someone)

hire – v. to give work or a job to (someone) in exchange for wages or a salary

pension – n. an amount of money that a company or the government pays to a person who is old or sick and no longer works

bilingual – adj. able to speak and understand two languages


分享到:


点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 full-time SsBz42     
adj.满工作日的或工作周的,全时间的
参考例句:
  • A full-time job may be too much for her.全天工作她恐怕吃不消。
  • I don't know how she copes with looking after her family and doing a full-time job.既要照顾家庭又要全天工作,我不知道她是如何对付的。
2 superintendent vsTwV     
n.监督人,主管,总监;(英国)警务长
参考例句:
  • He was soon promoted to the post of superintendent of Foreign Trade.他很快就被擢升为对外贸易总监。
  • He decided to call the superintendent of the building.他决定给楼房管理员打电话。
3 expertise fmTx0     
n.专门知识(或技能等),专长
参考例句:
  • We were amazed at his expertise on the ski slopes.他斜坡滑雪的技能使我们赞叹不已。
  • You really have the technical expertise in a new breakthrough.让你真正在专业技术上有一个全新的突破。
4 algebra MKRyW     
n.代数学
参考例句:
  • He was not good at algebra in middle school.他中学时不擅长代数。
  • The boy can't figure out the algebra problems.这个男孩做不出这道代数题。
5 guts Yraziv     
v.狼吞虎咽,贪婪地吃,飞碟游戏(比赛双方每组5人,相距15码,互相掷接飞碟);毁坏(建筑物等)的内部( gut的第三人称单数 );取出…的内脏n.勇气( gut的名词复数 );内脏;消化道的下段;肠
参考例句:
  • I'll only cook fish if the guts have been removed. 鱼若已收拾干净,我只需烧一下即可。
  • Barbara hasn't got the guts to leave her mother. 巴巴拉没有勇气离开她妈妈。 来自《简明英汉词典》
6 bullied 2225065183ebf4326f236cf6e2003ccc     
adj.被欺负了v.恐吓,威逼( bully的过去式和过去分词 )
参考例句:
  • My son is being bullied at school. 我儿子在学校里受欺负。
  • The boy bullied the small girl into giving him all her money. 那男孩威逼那个小女孩把所有的钱都给他。 来自《简明英汉词典》
7 discriminated 94ae098f37db4e0c2240e83d29b5005a     
分别,辨别,区分( discriminate的过去式和过去分词 ); 歧视,有差别地对待
参考例句:
  • His great size discriminated him from his followers. 他的宽广身材使他不同于他的部下。
  • Should be a person that has second liver virus discriminated against? 一个患有乙肝病毒的人是不是就应该被人歧视?
8 bully bully     
n.恃强欺弱者,小流氓;vt.威胁,欺侮
参考例句:
  • A bully is always a coward.暴汉常是懦夫。
  • The boy gave the bully a pelt on the back with a pebble.那男孩用石子掷击小流氓的背脊。

本文本内容来源于互联网抓取和网友提交,仅供参考,部分栏目没有内容,如果您有更合适的内容,欢迎 点击提交 分享给大家。