Ruby Schlaker

I have been working with Elaine and emergent bilinguals in Philadelphia since the Fall of 2019. Having attended a Spanish-English, dual-language elementary school and grown up in the linguistically diverse city of Providence, Rhode Island, I was eager to take this opportunity to critically reflect on my own educational and linguistic history. Both at Swarthmore and in Philadelphia classrooms, I simultaneously experienced many challenges and a sense of great fulfillment as I learned from emergent bilinguals and their teachers—about their lives, about my own privileges, and about our shared world. Far from what I expected when I first took an educational studies course, I have now decided to become an ELL-Certified Secondary School Social Studies teacher. The collective knowledge and love within the MTRC community gives me hope and inspiration for my own future as an aspiring teacher and community organizer.