The Nexus

Esperanza Gonzalez (9) proudly watched as her mother shared a conversation with Esperanza’s teacher. Because of Esperanza’s efforts, this parent-teacher conference ended the troubles that she dealt with for many months.

Esperanza’s mom, Sandy, came to the U.S. only three years ago from Mexico. At the time, Sandy was not familiar with the English language. This problem caused Esperanza to go through months of frustration.

On Back-to-School Nights, Esperanza had to accompany Sandy in order to translate for her.

“I was the only kid inside the classrooms and I felt embarrassed talking to my mom while the teacher was speaking to the room full of parents,” Esperanza said.

Esperanza felt uncomfortable inviting her friends over, fearing that her friends would say something negative about her Spanish-speaking mom.

“All [my mom] would say was ‘hi’ and ‘bye,’” Esperanza said. “When I went over to a friend’s house, I would have fun conversations with the other family members.”

Stress and social problems began to accumulate all related to Sandy’s language barrier.

“It felt like half of my life was being wasted because of my mom’s language problem,” Esperanza said.

For a few months, Esperanza tried to ignore the problems. However, she said she soon realized she couldn’t keep pretending they didn’t exist.

One day, Esperanza and her mom argued with each other because of their frustrations.

“My mom wanted me to translate a letter, and when I couldn’t think of the right Spanish words, she got really mad at me because she thought I never even tried to help her,” Esperanza said.

This argument prompted Esperanza to search for another solution to these problems. She didn’t want the fight to happen again.

Esperanza decided to try to convince her mom to attend English as a Second Language (ESL) classes at Miramar College. ESL students come from around the world and the classes help them learn English through immersion.

“I had to give her all the info that I knew about the classes,” she said. “They were free, they were almost the same time as [my] school was, and she could join whichever class she felt comfortable in.”

When Esperanza’s mom saw her daughter trying to persuade her, she finally gave in.

“I didn’t know my English affected her enough to make her find a solution for me,” Sandy said.

Every day, the ESL teacher assigned a pile of homework, and Esperanza and her mom both sat down to do their assignments, helping each other.

At times, Sandy told Esperanza about her day at school, and Esperanza did the same to her mother.

“These little stories helped me get closer with [my mom],” Esperanza said.

However, several weeks went by and Esperanza’s mom couldn’t see any change in her English skills. Day after day, she grew more and more frustrated, not knowing when she would be able to speak English fluently.

“A lot of my friends kept telling me that it would work if my mom would stay patient,” Esperanza said. “I told my mom exactly what my friends had said.”

After more than a year of taking classes, Sandy began to notice a change. She spoke more than enough English to get through an ordinary day.

“Workers at stores didn’t look at me weird when I asked them questions,” Sandy said. “They used to stare at me and wonder what I was trying to say.”

Now, instead of awkward pauses in between simple sentences, words flowed out of her mouth smoothly.

Rather than just nodding at everything people said, she replied with an actual sentence.

“I couldn’t believe how much she had changed,” Esperanza said. “I was so proud of her and I think that helping her changed my life just as much as it changed hers.”