Mira Costa teachers assume responsibilities of previous Costa Spanish teacher

By Max Rosenberg

Staff Writer

Mira Costa Spanish and French teacher Kimberly Romero, and substitutes, Pia Kawagoe and Nadia Smith, have taken over classes for teacher Crystal Meyer who left Mira Costa in the end of April after not receiving tenure for the following years.

All matters regarding employment in the school district are confidential, Principal Dr. Ben Dale said, and, therefore, the reason Meyer chose to leave prior to the end of the school year in June is not public.

Foreign Language Department Chair Lauri Resnikoff stated that the process of deciding whether or not a teacher is tenured goes through MBUSD administration, which determines if a teacher can continue teaching after two years. Throughout the year, periodic classroom observations are made on teachers without tenure.

“My role is to support the teachers in the foreign language department while they are here, so any decision on where people go is out of my control,” Resnikoff said.

Meyer taught three classes of Spanish One and two classes of French One. She had previously taught French for a number of years before coming to Mira Costa, but was teaching spanish for the first time in the 2015-2016 school year.

“Ms. Meyer did not involve as much participation as she did busy work.” Freshman Wyatt Saltzman said. “Ms. Kawagoe includes students in the learning and I find her class to be very engaging.”

Meyer’s spanish class is filled by spanish teacher Romero, who had an open Spanish One class and Kawagoe, a long term substitute. Smith, the substitute that filled in for the french class has worked at Mira Costa before.

“The substitutes are finishing out this school year for sure,” Dale said. “There is a very slight chance of them returning for the 2016-2017 school year, but nothing is for sure.”

While Romero will be returning next year to teach her own classes, Costa administration will hire someone to teach the open classes. The substitutes can apply and it is possible that they could become permanent teachers at Mira Costa. Dale stated that there is a significant amount of positive feedback from students that have the substitutes.

“It is pretty challenging picking up a new group of students this far into the year because it is not like teaching my Spanish One to another class,” Romero said. “I was the only Spanish One teacher with a free first period and it worked out well for me to help out for the remaining few weeks in the school year.”