Perla Baez: My English As A Second Language

309 Words2 Pages
I have had the pleasure of knowing Perla Báez for the past four years, as her English as a Second Language teacher and CREW leader in ninth grade at the Margarita Muñiz Academy, the only public dual-language college preparatory high school in the state of Massachusetts. She came as an adolescent to Massachusetts from the Dominican Republic and knew no English. Now she has blossomed into a mature, strong willed bilingual student. As a ninth grade ESL student, I worried that Perla’s introverted personality would hinder her academic and social growth but she soon proved me wrong. I quickly learned that she is very self-reflective and analytical. She may not be the first to raise her hand, but she was the first one to identify accurately the