Stand and Deliever

Stand and Deliver

This movie is a great inspirational movie that has to deal with a teacher, Mr. Escalante, who believes in his students at Garfield High School. Mr. Escalante was suppose to be a computer teacher there at that High School, but the school never got the funding for computers, because the state was looking into shutting the school down because of the low passing scores of the state tests. Mr. Escalante decided to teach a math class and quickly won the respect of his students. He then wanted to help prove not only the state wrong about the students at Garfield High, but also the other faculty members. So he decided to teach an advanced calculus class so that his 18 students could take and pass the A.P. Calculus test and be able to advance to college and other great jobs. No one at the school believed in Mr. Escalante and his 18 students. But astonishingly they worked hard to achieve the goal of passing that test and they all did. But because of their school having such bad reviews and these students being "from the wrong side of the street," then they were all accused of cheating. So therefore, they had to retake the test again and prove them wrong once again. And that is exactly what they did. They all passed the A.P. Calculus test for the second time. All of their hard work during weekends and during Christmas break paid off, they finally got people to believe in them.

One of the competencies that I saw in this movie is Competency 2, it says that the teacher understands student diversity and knows how to plan learning experiences and design assessments that are responsive to differences among students and that promote all student's learning. Mr. Escalante did this in numerous ways. He tried to break down how to learn math in ways that his 18 students could understand. He worked with them after hours and prepped them for the exam not only for the first time but also for the second. He never gave up hope, he believed in them. He didn't care what race or ethnic background they were from, like everyone else; he knew that they could succeed if someone would just try to teach them.

Another one I saw was Competency 5, which says that the teacher knows how to establish a positive classroom climate that promotes learning, equity, and excellence. Mr. Escalante did this every day. He made sure that any student that stepped into his classroom believed in themselves