A former Miami High student, Mr. Jara has returned as a math teacher to the high school he grew up with. Nearing the end of his second year here, he continues to devote himself to student success.

Education and Career

Mr. Jara graduated with the Class of 2008. A significant development during that time was overcoming his fear of math. “That’s one of the things that made the biggest difference in my life,” he said. “I had really good teachers such as Ms. Gonzalez who pushed me to do as much math as I could. I went from being happy just getting by in my math classes to taking calculus in senior year.”

High school taught Mr. Jara valuable life lessons. “It’s all about balance,” he said. “You can’t be all about your studies, you can’t be all about partying – you need to find balance or else everything suffers. When I first got here to Miami High, I was an ESOL student, but then I built my way up to AP classes. It’s not that you can’t do it – you just have to want to do it. Also, it’s always good to have a support system and know when to ask for help. No one knows if you’re drowning; no one knows if you’re having a bad time if you don’t let them know.”

After high school, Mr. Jara attended Miami Dade College and got his Associate’s Degree in Engineering. He then transferred to Florida International University and worked towards a Bachelor’s Degree in Engineering, but his GPA took a hit because he didn’t understand the material, and consequently lost the scholarship he had. However, he persisted and switched his major to Biology. In his final year, he returned to MDC to complete his remaining classes, and he got his bachelor’s degree in Biology in 2015.

During his time at college, Mr. Jara worked as a clinical research intern at the University of Miami and Nova Southeastern University.  He got his start into research because, while he was working at Best Buy, a customer told him about working at UM.

“She asked if I had ever done research before and if I would like to come work with her. Three years later, I left with an amazing experience, great friends, and a good mentor. You never know what opportunities you have available to you unless you ask, which is how I wound up one summer interning at the Hussman Institute for Human Genomics, a UM institute which does genetic studies,” he said.

Teaching at Miami High

Mr. Jara started teaching at Miami High in 2015, the same year he finished university. “I thought that clinical research would be the path I wanted to take,” he said, “but as life goes on, you realize that you have more that you need to take care of than the money you can make in certain careers. Teaching was out of nowhere for me, and I liked it.”

He felt that it would be nice to give back to the school that helped him out so much. “When I was looking into education, I reasoned that if I was going to go anywhere, I had to go and help out the community where I grew up,” he said.

Double-certified in mathematics and biology, Mr. Jara held the position of substitute Algebra 2 teacher in his first year and 9^th grade Physical Science teacher last year. This year, he teaches Probability & Statistics and Financial Algebra.

Returning to Miami High after being a student here is a blast from the past for Mr. Jara. He is glad to already know teachers from before who are willing to offer him their support. “Since I left here in 2008, things have changed a lot,” he said. “It’s nice to see familiar faces.”

Mr. Jara sees that teaching has its pros and cons. He said, “I enjoy making my students laugh and making sure that they are learning. That’s really what makes it worthwhile. I feel like one of the hardest parts of being a teacher, though, is giving it your all even if there are some people who do not appreciate it. However, that shouldn’t affect how you treat the ones who want to learn.”

A quote that motivates him is by Winston Churchill, which goes: “Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

Personal Life

The youngest of four siblings, Mr. Jara was born in Peru in 1990. After living there for almost 14 years, he moved to Florida and immediately enrolled at MHS. In his free time, he plays video games, watches movies, works out, and he recently started woodcarving.

He hopes to someday return to his home country. “I haven’t had the time to go back between working and studying,” he said, “but while I’m there, I could get to know all the places I haven’t been. It has so much history. When you’re living there, you don’t get to visit all the places like Machu Picchu.”