Swamped by depression, feelings of guilt, panic

It was 6:45 a.m. Ricardo Acuna took his multivitamins with ginseng and gingko biloba. He climbed into his Hyundai Santa Fe and drove. The sun rose behind him, but the December air was thick with mist. He switched on KPFK-FM and listened to the news. Iraq. Fighting. Death.

It had been a long semester. Today his students would take their final exams.

They’re struggling to read and write, he thought. How are they going to make that leap so they will truly begin to think about what is going on in this world? I can’t bridge that gap. There’s no way.

He gripped the wheel with both hands. His back muscles ached, and his eyesight clouded. To his right, the green hills of Glassell Park looked inviting: a place to escape. What he wanted most, he would remember, was to turn the Hyundai around, go home and write -- anything: a poem, a story about his life.

There aren’t enough Latino writers, he thought. He should be one of them. His voice should be out there, making an imprint in the world. Why am I doing this? I should be working this hard for my writing -- and not for teaching.

Slowly, quietly, he began to panic. He had gotten panic attacks before, in New York, back at Columbia University, when he was surrounded by too many people, too many buildings. He needed air. He rolled down the windows on the Hyundai. He saw students with backpacks. He took deep breaths.

He turned left and saw the big blue M on the concrete wall at Marshall High. Ricardo’s panic grew. Too many kids, too many cars, too many buses.

*

Could he go on? Ricardo Lira Acuna, 34, had joined a Los Angeles Unified School District intern program for mid-career professionals and college graduates without education credentials. He had set aside writing full time to teach English.

He wanted desperately to make a difference, to help all 150 students in his five classes make the leap, as he would put it. But he could see little, if any, progress. Indeed, two of the three students he had made special efforts to help were failing.

The third, a freshman who was nearly blind, needed assistance badly. If he quit, what would happen to her? What would become of the other two? What would become of all his students? What would become of him?

*

SHARING HIS HOPES

The first-period bell rang. Mayra Ramirez was early. She walked toward him quickly. Despite her difficulty seeing, she was gaining assurance.

“Here,” she said, timidly. She shoved a red-and-gold wrapped package into his hands. It was an end-of-the-semester gift: a bottle of cologne.

Oh no, he thought. Don’t give me a gift. You’re making things worse.

How could he be considering leaving? He felt guilty.

Oddly, he resented Mayra for making him feel that way. The prospect of quitting still beckoned, a strange comfort.

After the finals, he distributed a survey asking his students to grade him as a teacher. He said there would be no homework over the semester break. What if they come back and I’m not even here?

Then he did something unusual.

“I hope I’ve been able to help you,” he said. He looked at Mayra, but then he skimmed the room to include everyone. “I’m not perfect, and I know sometimes I wasn’t able to help you.”

Now his arms gestured swiftly, first closing and then opening, to gather them in and then to let them go. “I care about each one of you,” he said. “And I love you guys. You guys are great.”

Love?

They froze. He would remember how they looked at him: with wide eyes.

*

FRETTING OVER FAILURE

I have failed with Gusto.

-- Ricardo’s journal

*

He gave finals to his other classes and then asked them, as well, to grade him as a teacher. But with the sophomores -- including Jeremy Sentance and Gusto Jimenez -- he held his tongue. There was no farewell, no “I love you.”

Jeremy was absent. After his defiance with the root beer, he had not come back.

Gusto was present, however, cocky and blase. “What’s up, Acuna? Are we having a party today?”

“No, we’ve got to do a final.”

One student had a “Scarface” video. Gusto tried to talk Ricardo into skipping the test and letting the class watch it.

“You’re going to take the final,” Ricardo said.

Gusto said he did not know the answers. It would be a waste of time. Once more, the class was in turmoil. Ricardo added it to his memorable moments. Gusto, you’ve done it again.

He handed out the test.

While some of the students were still writing, Gusto got out of his seat to talk to them.

“What are you doing?” Ricardo demanded.

“Just give me a ‘Fail’ and leave me alone,” Gusto replied. He wanted to talk to everybody, he told a classroom visitor afterward, because it was their last day.

Ricardo would not let him.

Five minutes before the bell, Gusto tried again. He told Ricardo to ease up. Then he added: “You’re a rookie, Acuna, that’s your problem.”

It was as if Ricardo had been punched. His face tightened, his forehead wrinkled. He was hot, as angry as he had been with Jeremy a few weeks before.

The nerve of this kid. “I may be a rookie,” Ricardo said, one hand slicing the air, “but what other teacher has taken the time to talk to you the way I have? Who has helped you?”

Gusto sat silently. The bell rang. He darted out.

“Good luck,” Ricardo muttered.

*

GRADING THE TEACHER

When I go home, I’m more stressed and depressed. I want to escape.

-- Ricardo interview

*

Ricardo was surprised. Most of his students graded him with 4s and 5s, the highest marks they could.

Some probably did it to curry favor, he thought. Others, however, were sincere. He could tell by their comments. Am I doing something right?

* Joseph Abunas: “He cares about people who aren’t doing very well in this class namely me. I hope that he continues the great job and stay as the same fun teacher we know.”

* Kayla Vasquez: “he never lost hope in anyone of us. He would tell us that we could do whatever we wanted to do.”

* Ericka Muralles: “I learned to like reading.”

* Astrid Altaro: “I learned vocabulary, I learned lots of new words that I never imagine existed.... I learned how to take out my anger happiness by expressing myself in journals.”

* Liela Nelson: “You don’t rush on your teaching and make sure we understand something before you moved on ... and you are the only teacher that introduced me to a book that made me want to read it all.”

* Gustovo Jimenez: “hes A good teAcher but too uptight.”

The last was from Gusto.

Because Marshall was a year-round school, Ricardo’s winter break lasted into March 2004. He and his wife, Marvilla, went to Arizona, then Texas, to visit family. They did not talk about teaching.

Back home, Ricardo started writing again.

“So much is different, noticeably different,” Marvilla told a visitor. “He’s not upset every day.”

Nevertheless, one night he had a dream.

He was late.

All of his students were waiting, some lounging, others horsing around. He bolted out of his Hyundai. He was wearing his tie.

Out of the corner of an eye, he noticed his first-grade teacher, Mrs. Karem. She stood among his students, poised and distinguished and silent.

“I don’t know how long I’m going to be here,” he said, “but while I’m here, let’s get to a quick lesson.”

With a black marker, he tried to write his name on the white lesson board. No ink came out. He pressed harder. Over and over, he tried to write. Nothing. He tried another black marker. Nothing.

He went to a small chalkboard and picked up a piece of chalk. It would not work. He could not write his name. Forget it, he thought. “My name is Mr. Acuna,” he said. “Please repeat: Mr. Acuna.”

Silence.

He singled out students, one by one. “Say: Mr. Acuna.”

Each refused.

Some stood and walked away from their seats. They talked to each other.

He reorganized their desks. The room expanded. One wall bent, leading to another room filled with more students.

Like amoebas, the students began to multiply.

Mrs. Karem watched everything. Quietly, she wrote in a notebook.

“Sit down!” he yelled.

The students ignored him.

*

CHANGING COURSE

This is not something that is going to make me happy. I have not enjoyed this experience.

-- Ricardo interview

*

Deciding was harder than keeping Gusto quiet.

Ricardo had more than a month of his winter break left. As Marvilla cooked pork loins one evening in late January, he told her that going back into the classroom both terrified and depressed him.

He said his inexperience was hindering his students and that he was making no positive impact. It was not worth it. He wanted to be a writer. He had thought he could write part time, but his lesson plans, intern classes and paperwork left no time for creativity. He said he felt stifled and dragged down.

“You’re bailing on the kids,” Marvilla replied. Teaching was not about paperwork or money, she said. It was about 150 lives. Because he was Latino, maybe he was connecting with some of the kids and didn’t know it.

He and Marvilla argued.

Their quarrel rolled like a wave from the white kitchen with its chipped paint into the orange hallway, into the red office, into the living room, the dining room and finally the powder blue bedroom. They would recall their differences this way:

Ricardo did not want his students to feel abandoned, but they would be better off with someone who knew how to teach. His presence in the classroom was pointless.

Marvilla did not understand. How could he give up?

Teaching always brought her fulfillment, she said. Sadly, she conceded, a teacher had to have some kind of a calling or be a workaholic. Teaching, she said, was not like other professions.

Their argument seemed to go on for hours. But in the end, it all came down to his life’s dream.

He wanted to write.

She felt guilty. After all, it had been her enthusiasm and her love for her job that had influenced him to become a teacher. The last thing she wanted was to spoil his vision, his hopes or his future.

If he wanted to be a writer, she said, then he should be a writer.

She meant it. She would be the sole breadwinner. “We’ll have to count pennies,” she said. “But we can do it.”

He was surprised and heartened.

He knew he was risking everything: finances, maybe even his marriage. But it was a dream he had to follow.

He thought about it for three more weeks. Then, two weeks before the new semester, he reached a conclusion.

Ricardo decided to quit.

He called Kristin Szilagyi, the chairwoman of the English department at Marshall High School. “I’ve made a very difficult decision,” he said.

She listened, stunned.

“Would you consider finishing up the year?” she asked.

“No,” Ricardo replied. “I really don’t think I can.”

No administrators, by his recollection and that of officials at Marshall or in the intern program, called him afterward to urge him to stay.

*

STANDING BY HIS DECISION

I’m hoping one day I will reach those same students, whom I could not reach through teaching. I want to reach them with my writing.

-- Ricardo interview

*

For Jeremy, Ricardo’s decision mattered little. He had dropped out. “School’s not for me,” he said. He planned to get a GED by taking a high school equivalency test.

For Gusto, Ricardo’s departure was not a shock.

“It’s not like he has anything to do with my life. Teachers come and go. I knew he was going to be gone. He was kind of like me, but Mexicans don’t wear ties and tucked-in shirts.”

Still, Gusto said, Ricardo was cool. He had cared, even when Gusto hadn’t. “Tell that fool to come back.”

Mayra awoke at 5:30 a.m. on March 8, the first day of the new semester.

She put on bluejeans and an orange T-shirt. She carried a worn book, “Life Stories of 100 Famous Women,” including Princess Diana, Oprah Winfrey and Mother Teresa.

At her homeroom, she got the first hint that something was wrong.

The schedule card showed that her English classroom had changed. She pressed the card flat. She leaned in, her eyes inches from the letters. English 9B. Room 821.

“I don’t know where my English classroom is,” she muttered. She stopped abruptly. She picked up the yellow card and held it close to her eyes. She read a name.

Fulgoni D.

It had replaced Acuna R.

Her head snapped up. Her eyes went wide. “So he didn’t come back?”

The bell rang.

She picked up her red backpack. Her mind raced. She would never forget her anguish. Would her new teacher help her? Where was her classroom? What happened to Mr. Acuna? Was he really gone?

How would he help her with her spelling? How would she get 80% to 90% of her words right by October? How would she write in complete sentences?

He should have told us, she thought, so we wouldn’t be shocked.

Dennis Fulgoni, it turned out, did help her. He, too, let her sit up front so she could see the board. He read his questions aloud for her. He promised to give her his worksheets in advance.

But he did not know why Ricardo had quit. Neither did anyone else.

When Mayra got home, her mother could tell she was sad. She hardly nibbled at dinner, and she made it a point to fight with her little brother.

“Why are you mad?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she said.

Alone in the living room, she listened to music.

Beyonce made her realize she was angry at Ricardo. I realized I got me, myself and I, she sang, that’s all I got in the end....

Ruben Studdard made her sad. I’m sorry, he sang, I’m sorry 2004. She imagined Ricardo singing it to her.

But Amanda Perez made her feel thankful. An angel from the heavens above....

“The angel part,” she said, “reminds me of Mr. Acuna.”

*

COMMITTING THE PAST TO PAPER

Could I have done it? Could I have gone back?

-- Ricardo interview

*

Bob Grakal, a teaching coach at Marshall, said Ricardo seemed to have been doing well and rarely asked for help.

“We went out of our way last year to work with all our new teachers,” he said. “We can only do so much, and there are teachers who fall through the cracks.”

Mary Lewis, director of the L.A. Unified intern program, said it could have given Ricardo extra support. “But you’ve got to let us know. We don’t want you to suffer in silence.”

At his home in Eagle Rock, Ricardo was writing and revising screenplays that he hoped to pitch to Hollywood. He turned over an idea in his mind for a novel based on his childhood.

But he could not help thinking about his students, especially Mayra and Gusto. “I don’t want them to feel like I let them down,” he told a visitor. He worried about Gusto. “Could I have talked to him more?”

He steeled his resolve. “There isn’t anything I could have done to help him academically.”

Nonetheless, he said, at times, when he was writing, maybe driving, Gusto’s voice echoed in his mind. Aw, see, I knew it, Acuna. You’re a rookie.

Still, Ricardo was writing and reveling in it. He poured his emotions into a screenplay that he called “My First and Last as a Teacher.”

It featured Ray, a teacher who takes a break from his district intern class to smoke a cigarette. Administrators have taken away one of his classes, and his wife, Marta, wants him to spend more time with her. Tom, an intern friend, approaches.

TOM

First year is the hardest. It gets better. Or so I’ve heard.

RAY

I hope you’re right. I really do.

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

About This Series

Erika Hayasaki observed Ricardo Acuna’s classes for more than 40 hours. She interviewed him repeatedly and visited his home. Her story also is drawn from observations as well as home visits and interviews with his wife, Marvilla Bonilla, and students Gusto Jimenez, Mayra Ramirez and Jeremy Sentance. Their actions, words, thoughts and emotions were either witnessed by Hayasaki or described directly by them.

Hayasaki visited and conducted interviews five times at the Los Angeles Unified School District intern summer training program. She also interviewed David and Carla Sentance, Jeremy’s parents; Milagro Ramirez, Mayra’s mother; Bob Grakal, a teaching coach at Marshall High School; Kathleen O’Connell, an assistant principal at Marshall High School; Kristin Szilagyi, chairwoman of Marshall High School’s English department; Beth Irizarry, an intern at Marshall; Erin Winter, an intern at Wilson High School; Mary H. Lewis, the director of the L.A. Unified intern program; Susan Stealey and Nancy Bell, program instructors; Arnie Weiner, a program director; Emily Feistritzer, president of the National Center for Alternative Certification; and Linda Darling-Hammond, professor of education at Stanford University.

Acuna provided screenplays, poetry, journal entries, lesson plans and intern assignments reflecting his thoughts, concerns and workload. Some students, including Ramirez, also provided journal entries, poetry and class assignments.