City native, Teach for America see better days

Alan Borsuk:

It would have been easy to predict an unpromising future for Maurice Thomas when he was born. His mother was single, 17 years old, and the product of a low-income, troubled Milwaukee home.

But Thomas had some big things going for him: His mother's dedication to education. Teachers who pushed him forward with care and skill. And his own commitment to making a difference.

"Trajectory" is a word used often by Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach for America, the organization that over two decades has trained more than 20,000 high performing college graduates to be teachers and placed them in high-needs classrooms across the country for their first two years out of school.

Kopp is convinced that the trajectory of the lives of children - in fact, of entire communities - can be turned for the better, especially by education.

When Kopp published her book, "A Chance to Make History," last winter, Maurice Thomas, who was with Teach for America in Atlanta, was one of the people she wrote about in detail. She described his impact as a teacher and how he had become deeply involved in getting his students to succeed.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at October 4, 2011 3:16 AM
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