I arrived at college thinking, like many freshmen, I knew what I wanted to do. I wish I could say that I had known but truthfully, my road to choosing Spanish as my primary major took me three years to figure out. I always double majored in Spanish because I knew that at the end of it all, I would end up being a Spanish teacher but, I thought I needed something “more solid” to go alongside the double-major. I came into UMass as a Nutrition major, minoring in Spanish, in order to “solve world hunger”. I soon realized that this was not the way to go about such an enormous problem and also, that I was horrible at science.
My sophomore year, after speaking with my business oriented mother, and still holding on to my desire to change the world and solve world hunger, I thought that a double major in Spanish and Resource Economics deemed fit. Yet again, I soon discovered that I was very bad at business classes, neither did I agree with what I was being taught in these classes and that in fact, this major required a lot of business.
Everything changed in one day during the fall of my junior year. After a defeating day of economics classes, and worse, realizing that I would not be able to go abroad due to the fact that I had to take econ classes, I decided to make an emergency visit to my res-econ advisor’s office. While watching the upset, annoyed and confused look on my face as she told me of all my course requirements, she interrupted the conversation with a very thought-provoking question: “Why on earth are you a res-econ major?” I said, “I do not know.” And followed up with a tearful explanation about how I just wanted to be a Spanish teacher and go to Spain. In that moment, I realized what I was doing was ridiculous and that I needed to do what I truly wanted. After the meeting, by coincidence, I had a Spanish conversation class with Carole Cloutier. Professor Cloutier is the advisor for the Spanish Secondary Teacher Education Program (STEP) and so, I decided to stay after class to see what the program was all about. Again emotional, I told her that I just wanted to be a Spanish teacher and with that exclamation, we went immediately to her office to start planning for my course requirements to complete the program by May 2020.
What ending up happening was, I changed my major to a primary in Spanish, then was required to complete several education classes and a psychology course. From going abroad to San Sebastián, Spain, I fulfilled the rest of my Spanish major requirements. The program also requires that you pass the Communication and Literacy MTEL and the Spanish MTEL. On top of this, you are required to take a ACTFL fluency exam. This exam is a 30-minute phone call with a Spanish speaker and they test your fluency level of Spanish. The requirement is that you place in the Advanced range.
The program in itself is hard-work. You must complete a portfolio full of various things including: 3 culture essays from previous classes (must be different professors and different cultural topics, based in different countries), a research paper regarding some topic of research, professional development, and a journal that you will write during you Pre-Practicum.
What you do during the program is complete your Pre-Practicum during your senior fall semester, at a local high school, essentially shadowing a Mentor Teacher. You will teach 5 lessons that will be evaluated and some will be observed by Professor Cloutier. Spring semester of your senior year, you will be in you Practicum. Here you will have more responsibility and teach the class alongside your Mentor Teacher.
Yes, it is a lot of work, pero vale la pena. It has been the most incredible experience of my life and I cannot wait to be a Spanish teacher and love my students. I do not believe there is any better way to change the world that to educate our future with a subject that I am so passionate about.