By Trina, 7th Grade Student, KIPP San Francisco Bay Academy
Trina submitted content to the Team & Family Blog this month because she wants her teachers to know just how influential they are to her.
My name is Trina, and I go to KIPP San Francisco Bay Academy. I’m the in the Class of 2017. I think KIPP teachers are extremely important because they teach us everything we need to know to reach our goal of climbing the mountain to college.
I can remember back to my very first day as a KIPPster. We learned that we would need to “work hard” and “be nice”. Working hard meant that in our English classes we would be reading and writing every day. When I came to KIPP, I found out that I was at a second grade reading level reader in the fifth grade! I was shocked, so I worked hard and got to the sixth grade reading level by the end of the year.
Ms. MacDonald helped me to read a lot more fluently and with better comprehension. With my writing teacher, Ms. Collins, we learned about capitalization, grammar, and essay writing. My first writing pieces were horrible, but little by little my writing skills got better. My math teacher, Ms. Szewczyk, taught us a lot of things that I might not have learned in other schools. She taught us chants to learn the times tables easier. My science teacher, Mr. Roberts, had many clever ways to teach us to remember things. We learned a song and that helped me memorize the order of the water cycle: evaporation, condensation, and precipitation. I’ve learned other phenomenal things from my KIPP teachers too, like how to create a website and how to read and play music. Now I play the piano in our school orchestra.
Being a KIPPster isn’t just about working hard, though. Being a KIPPster also means being nice and learning how to be yourself. In fifth grade, we went to a program called Vida Verde for a three-day field trip. At Vida Verde, I learned to appreciate the outdoors, climbing a tree for the first time and sleeping in a teepee in the meadow. We even got to go on a farm which had goats, and we milked them to make cheese and ice cream. My time away with my KIPP teachers and classmates also helped me to improve my social skills. One night we had to clean the dishes, and we all had to work together to get the job done.
I’m shy, but ever since I came to KIPP, I’m not as shy as I was before. I can’t wait until I achieve my dream of being a lawyer. I’m not sure that I would have this dream if it wasn’t for KIPP. KIPP has changed me a lot, and I’m still changing!
To learn more about teaching at KIPP, visit www.kipp.org/teachers >
