Autobiography
MY FAMILY
EDUCATION
My First Home
I have many pleasant memories growing up in the Philippines: tumbang preso, patintero, habulan and taguan were a few of the games I played on the streets with my siblings and extended family in the neighborhood.
I was seven when my mother passed away at age 35. My father and grandmother (his mother-in-law) joined forces in raising six girls. While my father focused on providing for us, my grandmother became a mother for another generation. Papang (what we called my dad), was a contractor who offered “deferred payments” to private schools for his plumbing services so he could have his daughters attend a school he knew he may not be able to afford otherwise. He always told us that education was the only wealth he can ever pass on to us. My grandmother was a seamstress. It was easy for any child to believe that her sewing machines were magic boxes that turned any fabric into beautiful dresses and astonishing costumes.
Childhood & Education
The earliest memory I have of learning how to read and count was at home. At age three, I was sorting colors and shapes using the buttons, spools and threads in my grandmother’s shop, counting and pairing up nuts and bolts in my dad’s construction office. Of course, there were the nightly shared reading with my grandmother or any of my four older sisters. As my parents realized that I learned differently from the way schools taught (mostly listening and memorizing), they tried to provide me the necessary support to get through schooling: hiring a tutor, enrolling me in extra reading classes, or simply taking me and my siblings to different places to widen our experiences.
Surviving school meant studying for quizzes and tests, getting a passing grade, then mostly forgetting what I studied for when grades were recorded. Sure, I enjoyed school, but I knew that it was not so much for the academic work, but for the friendships I formed. In retrospect, I can say that the knowledge I gained are those I learned with my peers: through projects, chats and dialogues, late night research, and actually being a part of the action.
This brings me to the Revolution of 1986, the first-ever, bloodless uprising in world history.
Secondary school gave me the opportunity to meet bold teachers who veered away from recommended textbooks and allowed students to learn from what was then confronting us: injustice. This period marked my heightened awareness of the political turmoil in the Philippines- an era when a dictator and his fellow oppressors, suppressed freedom and disregarded basic human rights. My teachers went beyond required books by introducing us to a variety of resources (underground newspapers & clippings from Martial Law) from archived sections of the libraries to documentaries from abroad showing different versions of the news we saw in the country. They encouraged us to critique what we read and we engaged in meaningful debates. My teachers’ radicalism and bravery exposed me to social justice, and prepared me to witness the 1986 People Power Revolution that overthrew a dictator. My teachers showed me that what I see and what I am told deserve greater analysis, greater scrutiny, just as Dewey advocated. They revealed the importance of continuously seeking knowledge and the impact of endlessly searching for truth.
Unfortunately, the road to meaningful change is long, even deceitful. I realized that overthrowing a dictator was just the first step in a people's quest for justice and democracy, and in the absence of accountability and respect for the basic rights of its people, such a revolution could be rendered powerless in affecting real change.
Another life-shifting moment for me was majoring in Special Education in the University of the Philippines. This is where I began to understand my learning difference and when I learned to embrace and work around it. Given the combination of that safe space my Professors provided so naturally and the persistence and determination that my parents have always emphasized, I graduated from UP College of Education with a Bachelor's in Special Education and later obtained my Masters Degree in Reading Education. By this time, I knew for sure that teaching was my calling. I also made it my mission to develop literacy skills and teach my students to read and later learn from reading.
Teaching Experience: Philippines
My first thirteen years in the field of education was spent in the Philippines. I dedicated my time to students with disabilities in private schools as well as volunteering my time to organizations who supported literacy development among public school children. On weekdays, I taught students with hearing impairment, autism or learning disabilities in general education settings and provided them after school reading instruction. This type of service was not a part of any school system- their parents advocated and paid exorbitant fees to make it happen. On some weekends, I volunteered in children's museums and other organizations that worked with children in the slum areas of Metro Manila, holding story-telling sessions or parent education.
During one of these occassions, I overheard a child, barely 12 years old, saying that she had to stop schooling to help her parents work.
As a believer that education is what moves us in the socio-economic ladder, I was stunned to realize that for many, it is a luxury - not easily attainable because of the the daily demands imposed upon by poverty and a system made defective because of leaders whose self-interest dominates over sense of service.
Migrating to the U.S.
As much as I wanted to stay, my role has shifted: it was time to provide for my dad. There are 1.06M Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) and I became a part of this statistics in 2004.
It was a pleasant surprise to see that children with special needs here has a myriad of free services available to children: OT, PT, Speech Therapy, and periodic after-school academic intervention supports. Teachers had various opportunities for professional development, too, that I couldn't help but feel envious for the children and teachers back home.
I also had to navigate the unfamiliar: cultural diversity. I celebrated being able to work with people from all backgrounds and everyday became a learning experience. Sharing our stories about family, cultural practices, food, etc. are just few moments of fun. But there was another side to this coin and it was discovering racial biases- harmful generalizations that other people have about my race, as well as those I have of others. If, back home, there was "colorism"-people favoring the light skinned, here, there is racism.
Then, there is poverty- something that I never thought existed in a "first world". Even though the US has never seen the level of poverty that exists in other countries, I can see that its effects are all the same, all too familiar and disadvantageous especially to children.
Wealth is power and power meant accumulating more wealth- while the poor gets stuck in the bottom of a highly stratified society, forgotten and deprived of social mobility.
This should not be the case.
For years I have helped children learn to read. But as I move forward with leadership, I wish to do something more, something greater... I hope to take with me all the lessons that I learned from my students, their families and their lived experience. I also would like to remember the stories of other leaders who paved the paths for their students' lives to improve.
My role is once again shifting and my identity as a reading teacher is expanding as well. In continuing this journey, I will remember one great leader's words:
Literacy is broader than reading.
Without literacy, the students could not know
their rights in a democracy,
which is basic or functional literacy.
-Ethel Thompson Overby