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What It’s Like to Be a Student of a Corps Member: Network Connections

Meet Geraldine, an Indianapolis seventh-grader who has a passion for science and dreams of one day becoming a computer programmer.

By The TFA Editorial Team

October 2, 2019

This series highlights the deep connections between students, corps members, teacher coaches, school staff, and other alumni across the Teach For America network. In this episode, we meet Geraldine, a seventh-grader who is passionate about science and dreams of one day becoming a computer programmer and is taught by a Teach For America corps member at Enlace Academy in Indianapolis.

The Student

Geraldine is a student at Enlace Academy. At school, Geraldine enjoys the different new and exciting projects she gets to work on in teacher and corps member, Krystal Coronado’s science class.

How Principals Support Teachers and Students

Meet Cody Whitesell, a 2008 Indianapolis corps member, and school leader at Enlace Academy, whose time in the corps gave him the tools necessary to provide opportunities for the students he serves. 

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What It's Like to Teach in the Corps

Meet Krystal Coronado, a 2018 Indianapolis corps member, and science teacher at Enlace Academy, who works to empower kids daily with the support from her TFA network.

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How Coaches Support Teachers

Meet José González, a TFA teacher impact coach who works closely with corps members during their two-year commitment to help them develop their teaching skills.

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Supporting Schools at the District Level

Meet Jamie VanDeWalle, a school administrator who oversees a group of schools that are finding innovative ways to drive strong student achievement.

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Join the Corps

Redefine opportunities for students—and yourself—by applying to teach as part of the Teach For America corps.

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'I Want to be a Computer Programmer": Transcript

My favorite subject in school is science. We've been learning about genetics and we’re going to be creating DNA strips out of playdough to represent the dominant and recessive traits.

My name is Geraldine, I am a seventh-grader at Enlace Academy.

Some of the things I like about Enlace Academy are the variety of ways to learn things, we have opportunities to learn from each other. There’s one-on-one with the teacher.

Ms. Coronado has a very interesting personality, she has a very positive vibe to her. She knows how to make people laugh, she has, like, nice energy. 

I want to be a computer programmer. 

And Ms. Coronado does this thing with us, they’re computer simulations, so she, like, allows us to use the computers to see, well kind of see, what the subject that we’re learning about looks like, even though we can’t actually see it.

She has different ways of explaining what we’re learning about, not just the way the whole class learns it.

Ms. Coronado makes me believe, like, I can be upfront with her. If I don’t understand something, she won’t be frustrated because I won’t get it, she’ll help me understand it.