By Samantha Elizabeth Vélez

Excerpt of interview with Sheggai Tamerat, 9th Grade English Teacher, John D. O’Bryant School of Mathematics and Science

Sam: What do you think makes exam schools more exclusive than non-exam schools in the BPS

Sheggai: I think in many ways we have the same kind of budget issues that other Boston Public Schools have, and many would argue, not enough technology. Our facility could be a lot better. And so I think in many ways we run into many of the same problems. We do test in, so the kids can test in for seventh grade and for ninth grade. I think definitely it’s difficult because there are only two years essentially when a student can test into the exam schools, seventh grade and ninth grade. Sometimes students struggle in ninth grade or prior to ninth grade, so maybe they’re not ready to test into an exam school at that particular part of their life. So I think in that way because there are only two different times a student can come into the exam schools, it’s a little bit exclusive.

And I think that sometimes people think about exam schools like, “These kids are smart. These kids are going be successful and are going to do well.” But kids are kids, and there are some struggles and obstacles that come with transitioning from middle school to high school for anybody. There are challenges—what it means to be fourteen years old, fifteen years old, and I think that we have to remember that as well. So just because a kid goes to an exam school doesn’t mean that they have all of the tools that they need to be successful. It doesn’t mean that they were straight A students in their previous school. It means that they had a good GPA [and]they did well on the ISEE. So I think that, in some ways I understand that there’s a feeling of exclusivity amongst the exam schools, but our students look like and have many of the same problems as students everywhere in the district. So I can say that of [the] O’Bryant—I don’t want to speak on behalf of Latin or Latin Academies.

Sam: What’s your opinion on exam school education? Do you think an exam school education improves a student’s life performance?

Sheggai: Going back to that point—kids are kids, right? So some kids are motivated by different things. So if I come in and I know that these opportunities are available and are here then the hope is that a student is going to take advantage of those opportunities. But not every kid is going to. So just because I’m sitting here at the O’Bryant, it doesn’t mean that I’m going to Harvard. It doesn’t mean that I’m going to get a full-ride into college. But it does mean that there are many, many potential opportunities for me.

The reality is you can be smart, but you can still be lazy. You know that too, right? So lots of people are academically smart, and they do nothing with it. And then we have a lot of people who work really hard, and those are the people who are really successful. Their eyes are open, they’re very aware of the opportunities and they want to work for it. And those are the students that could go on to take on internships, to go on to great colleges. One of the things that was really kind of important for me in high school and even now, is travel. I like to take my students abroad. But if somebody hands you a paper and says, “Hey do you want to come to China with me?” when you’re in ninth grade, or tenth grade, you may say, well, I’d rather spend the summer with my friends. I may not want this particular opportunity right now. Some students are thinking about all those things and how that’s going to be important and impactful for the rest of their lives. I think that if you come to O’Bryant (and I’d imagine at many of the other exam schools), you have lots of opportunities, but it’s up to the students themselves to take advantage of them.

Sam: If you could paint a picture: students from this school or other schools being tutored by higher grade levels, or students from exam schools tutoring other students that may need extra tutoring, regardless of whether they’re in an exam school or not. Could the tutors count that as community service hours, how do you think that would benefit the students?

Sheggai: I think it would be great. Last year there was a teacher here who organized that. The course itself was a pretty incredible course. The teacher that [taught the course] was also a ninth grade history teacher. It was his elective history class…and part of that course was that students on a weekly basis went to a couple of schools—I think the Trotter was one school, I think the Timilty was another school—and the way that I hear him talk about the experiences of those kids. . .[T]hese are some kids who are struggling on their own, these are seniors who may be struggling in their own classes, but to watch them explain material to a student in elementary school [or] middle school gives them a sense of confidence themselves. And so they left school every day for a part of the afternoon and then they reflected and talked about some of the things that they were experiencing. When they would come back, they’d talk about ESL, how to deal with students that are struggling with their academic course work, or students that had a lot of drama at home. So it was good because sometimes I think we feel [our] problems are so unique to [ourselves] that we forget that we all go through many of the same kinds of problems and obstacles. And I think it’s important to be reminded [that] when we cross over those challenges and cross over those obstacles, we can help somebody behind us too. I think it’s helpful for academic reasons, but it’s also helpful for a sense of love, just generally.