Pablo

Then there was my student, Pablo. Until Pablo’s senior year, I never had him as a student. I came to know Pablo just from his ubiquitous presence in the hallways- before class, during class, and after class. Wherever I went in Fairfax during my conference periods (non-class preparation period for teachers), I seemed to run into Pablo and his girlfriend. Pablo wore the usual tagger clothing- white t-shirt, baggy pants- while sporting a closely shaved head. Yet I never got any hint that he actually tagged at school. Rather, Pablo and his girlfriend sauntered aimlessly in the hallways for hours at a time. When I approached them and asked them to get to class, I invariably encountered a polite, even pleasant response: “I would go to class but Mr./Ms. XXX is so boring that I start crying when I sit down,” he would say with a laugh. Or “Mr./Ms. XXX hates me and I know that I won’t pass no matter what.” I would launch into my canned response about having to deal with all types of authority figures (teachers, bosses) and that you’d better get used to the good, the bad, and the ugly. Pablo would smile pleasantly and continue to meander. When I brought Pablo’s truancy up with our Deans, I would get a shrug and some response like “We can’t kick him out for ditching. And he doesn’t seem to cause any major problems. So I wouldn’t worry too much.” But I persisted.

Anytime I encountered Pablo, I would try to provide some reason for him to attend classes more regularly (importance of graduation, ability to make good money, whatever). My efforts failed miserably. For at least two years, Pablo continued to walk

On the first day of school last year, Pablo walked into my room- as a student in my senior Government class. Before class even began, I asked to speak with him in the hallway. “Pablo, I need you to come to class every day. It’s important. I’m going to be at graduation in June and I want to see you on-stage. It’s a day you will remember the rest of your life.” This time, Pablo did not smile or laugh. He nodded and headed back into class. I wondered how many of my classes he actually would attend.

I was pleasantly surprised. Pablo attended all of my classes the first week. I discreetly complimented him on this, just saying “You’re on a roll. Keep it up.” Keep it up he did. Over the course of the year, Pablo missed just a handful of days. The last day of the year he told me that he had ditched my class only once.

As Pablo had made up all of the classes he failed while ditching in previous years, he actually was in a position to graduate. .While Pablo did reasonably well in my class, this was not the case in one of his classes. He hovered between a “D and a “F.” Just before the end of the semester, Pablo received a “F’ on a project he supposedly worked hard on. “I’m gonna yell at that bitch,” Pablo screamed as he walked into my class. His pleasant demeanor had evaporated. “That’s it. I can’t do it. I’m done.”

I again asked Pablo to go outside in the hallway. “Pablo. If you’re going to let Ms. XXXX stop you from graduating, everything that you’ve done this year will have gone to waste. If someone had told me at the beginning of the year that you’d come to 80% of my classes, I would have been thrilled. And you’ve come to just about every class. Don’t let Ms. XXX screw it up for you. Go talk to her and find out what you need to do to pass the class. And if it’s OK, I’ll do the same.” Pablo had calmed a bit, although he continued to seethe for the rest of class.

Over the next week, Pablo did talk to Ms. XXX, as did I. With a strong performance on his final, Pablo could pass. Studying like he had never studied before, Pablo took the final. The next day, he came to my room- shaking.

“I did it,” he said pounding his fist on my desk. “Not by much, but I did it. I’m gonna get my diploma. I’m gonna get my diploma.”

He said down and exhaled deeply several times. He could hardly speak. I asked him if his family and friends were going to the graduation. “Hell yes. I’m gonna buy a whole bunch of tickets. No one in my family has ever graduated from high school. All my homies from the 'hood dropped out. I’m the first of my homies to graduate. Some are in jail. Some have jobs. At graduation, you’re gonna see a whole lot of shaved head guys shouting when I get on stage.” And with that, Pablo walked out, still finding something to punch in celebration.

The last day of school (the day after graduation), I was cleaning my room. In walked Pablo holding his official diploma- thanking me for all I had done. “I want a picture of the two of us with my diploma.” A friend snapped a couple pictures of us sandwiching his diploma. I can’t say that either of us had dry eyes.