Magaly Miralles' biography
Magaly Miralles remembers herself as an 8-year-old, fresh from her native Venezuela, sitting bewildered in a second-grade classroom in the United States.
Since the school had no English language learning program for a bright young Spanish speaker with virtually no knowledge of English and no understanding of North American culture, she recalls herself being one of those children who “went home in tears every afternoon.” The memory remained with her long after she went back with her family to Venezuela, completed high school and university, earning a degree in pharmacology, and began a career as a pharmacist. While studying at Universidad Santa Maria in Caracas, she still found time to teach English language learners in grades 7-12.
Following her return to the United States in the mid-1990s, Magaly began her second – and lasting – career starting as an ESL educational assistant in Kirkland, Wash., where her fluency in Spanish and English gave her a special relationship with Spanish-speaking children trying to learn English. After six years in Washington schools, she moved to suburban Chicago in 2001, where she became a second-grade bilingual teacher in Aurora, initiating an innovative program that increased her students’ attendance and grades, and involving parents in their children’s learning. While there, she earned a master's degree summa cum laude in elementary education from Northern Illinois University in DeKalb and received an award for her action research in reading fluency in a second-grade bilingual classroom.
Relocating to Minnesota in 2005, Magaly joined the staff of Red Pine Elementary School in Eagan, where she holds the position of K-5 ELL teacher. She has initiated pilot programs in collaborative teaching and in extended services for ELL’s in kindergarten. A significant part of her educational practice is getting to know the children and their families and connecting the families with the community services they often need. She recognizes that for ELL's the task is greater than merely learning English. It requires bridging the gulf between the culture of their parents and the unfamiliar American culture without losing the traditions their families have brought to their new country. Hence, in addition to her teaching, she interprets for parents and teachers in parent-teacher conferences and other venues, and makes sure that parents understand the curriculum, how their children are doing in school and how they can help their children at home.
For her inclusive work with students, parents and the community, Magaly received the Human Rights Award given by Education Minnesota in 2008. In her acceptance speech she said, “My passion and commitment has been to work with families from diverse ethnic and economic backgrounds, especially families typically labeled as ‘hard-to-reach.’ ” Those families, like her own years ago, “still face cultural differences and language barriers, but now they fear losing their children to a new culture or feel threatened by being physically separated” from their children. With the goal of diminishing that fear and isolation, she has added to her activities the role of “heritage Spanish” instructor of parents with children 2 to 10 years old in her district’s Hispanic community.
It is essential to Magaly to be certain that not a single child goes home in tears as she did when she was a second-grader.
Although her fluency in Spanish and English makes her an ideal teacher for young Hispanics, her gift for understanding the pleasures, interests, and quandaries of all children assures her success with others from widely separated continents and cultures. She calls her students “little sponges” ready to sop up all the information available to them in English as well as their native languages, and she encourages them by honoring their traditions equally with those of the United States. By pointing out the kinships among cultures, such as the synchronous festivals of the Hmong New Year and the American Thanksgiving – both celebrating the harvest – she expands the knowledge of her students and their families, as well as those proficient in English.
Her outstanding educational practice and her care for colleagues, students, and families inspire Red Pine staff as well as her students. Principal Gary Anger says of her, “Magaly is the best ELL teacher I have ever worked with and one of the finest educators I have ever had the honor to work beside.”
March 01, 2010