Psychology teacher recalls experiences teaching at East San Jose charter school

Hana Chen, who has taught history and psychology here for the past two years, was stunned to hear the news of a fatal car accident that occurred in East San Jose on Jan. 27.

A speeding 19-year-old driver killed a pedestrian after he lost control of his silver Nissan. He tried to brake, but it was too late. Kiran Pabla, 24, was pinned against a tree and died instantly.

The driver of the Nissan was Gabriel Becerra, a former student of Chen’s at Leadership Public Schools-San Jose (LPS San Jose), a small charter school located in the heart of East San Jose, an area susceptible to gang violence. Becerra is now charged with vehicular manslaughter.

“He is a bright, kind young man who made a poor choice, and will now face some very serious consequences for his actions,” Chen said.

Teaching in an area with very different demographics than Saratoga’s, Chen worked for three years at LPS.  While there, she nurtured and encouraged underprivileged high school students to achieve success despite their difficult circumstances. She tried to open her students’ eyes to see a future beyond failure.

With only 233 students enrolled, LPS offers a close-knit community.

Most students at LPS come from low-income families and are eligible for free or reduced price lunch. Approximately 85 percent are Latino.

“I met some of the most incredible students and fellow teachers during my time at LPS-San Jose,” Chen said. “There are still several students whom I continue to keep in touch [with].”

For example, Chen helped a student receive a valid Social Security number through the DREAM Act, legislation that grants permanent residency to certain immigrants who have graduated from high school. The student is now pursuing her college degree, while also working to help support her family. Chen continues to keep contact with her and several others via email and even phone. 

Chen said many teens there lacked emotional support because of the few guidance counselors at the school and because many of their parents “were absent, either physically or emotionally.”

“Many of the parents worked long hours or had other things that seemed to occupy their attention,” Chen said. “Some parents had never navigated the American education system, so they just didn’t know what questions to ask or what expectations to have.” 

Although some students needed more parental support, most students were fortunate enough to have the community to lean on, as LPS was a “strong supporter of the mantra ‘it takes a village to raise a child.’”

“The students at my charter school needed a lot of support, both socially, emotionally and academically,” Chen said. “The teachers that were at that school were some of the most caring, compassionate and driven people I have ever worked with.”

In one case, Chen helped to rebuild a sophomore’s personal life. The student, who had recently delivered a baby, found herself struggling to cope with the idea of having a child while facing academic pressure.

“I helped her stay organized, tutored her in work that she had missed during her absence and [helped] her create make-up [work] plans that were suitable for both her and all of her teachers,” Chen said.

With the much-needed assistance from Chen, this student went on to graduate with honors and currently has “a happy, healthy little boy.”

Chen became close with students similar to her through the school’s looping system, where teachers have the same group of students for three consecutive years.

“This looping process was the biggest thing that helped [me] build relationships [with students]. They got to know me and trusted me and their other teachers, who also ‘looped,’” Chen said. 

To help these students reach their maximum potential, Chen said that she often spent long hours after school working on lesson plans, which conflicted with her personal schedule.

“I found myself constantly defending my desire to be home with my family by 5 p.m. on regular working days and that culture became exhausting,” Chen said.

Eventually, Chen made the decision to leave the charter school and apply for work at Saratoga High, a job that has allowed her to have more time with her family. Here, Chen discovered a new group of teachers she could also learn from.
While teaching at Saratoga, Chen realized that the “Saratoga Bubble” is similar in some ways to the bubble that existed at LPS San Jose, where “many of [her] students had never even left the East Side of San Jose, let alone the state or the country.”

Although Saratoga’s bubble often seems to limit students from gaining insight into different communities, Chen attempts to break this barrier by telling her current SHS students stories about LPS.
“I find that her stories about her previous school open my eyes about how privileged we are in Saratoga,” said junior Michelle Handoko, a student in Chen’s third-period Psychology class.