Hispanic Heritage Month: Teacher from Spain inspires students in Palm Beach County

Digital Content Reporter/ Traffic Anchor

WELLINGTON, Fla. —

For Sergio Garcia, keeping his students engaged isn’t a challenge.

“We are doing a lot of a small group or a lot of labs like hands-on activities,” said Garcia, a science teacher at Polo Park Middle School.

On Tuesday, students worked together and measured the mass and volume of different objects, but they did it all in Spanish.

“I’m with a dual program, so I’m teaching science both in Spanish and in English,” he said.

Garcia is a visiting teacher from Oviedo, Asturias, the capital of a province in northwestern Spain.

“The Florida Department of Education has a collaboration with the Ministry of Spain through this program that is called the visiting teacher program,” said Patricia Ordóñez-Feliciano, Ph.D., the executive director of multicultural education and school transformation for the School District of Palm Beach County. “And, what they do is they allow for visiting teachers from Spain, their experienced teachers, to come in and teach in our schools.”

This is Garcia’s second-year teaching at Polo Park Middle School, more than 4,000 miles away from home.

“It’s kind of, kind of crazy that he took that chance to come from where he didn’t know anything about just to teach,” said Ryan Cabrejo, a seventh-grader in Garcia’s class.

Garcia said the experience has allowed him to learn about the different communities in Palm Beach County, just as his students learn about his home.

“We have like kids from so many different countries that all of them speak Spanish, but there’s from Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina,” he said. “There’s also some kids who are from the U.S. whose families are also from the U.S., but they are in the program, and they have learned Spanish as well,” he said.

He said the program teaches students more than just another language.

“They apart from learning Spanish, of course, which is important, they also build like a sense of community,” said Garcia.

And the students are grateful for it.

“We’re blessed to have him here, to teach us new things every day in Spanish and, like, help us learn basically new words if you don’t understand it,” said eighth-grader Ana Sofía Roldán Gálvez. “Now I feel like I can spell, talk and write much better in Spanish, especially with my family,” added Kamila Fernandez, a seventh-grader.

For Garcia, the lessons go both ways.

“I feel so proud of them,” he said.

Although he admits he sometimes gets homesick, Garcia said the experience has been worth the long journey. He hopes the lessons his students learn in science, the Spanish-language and community stay with them long after they leave his classroom.

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