Normally upon meeting a teacher who naturally wears a mean face, you aren’t expecting to have the greatest time in their classroom. However, this isn’t always the case. Ms. Delgado, a social studies and psychology teacher at Miami High, is aware of the expression she displays, yet it’s the biggest surprise to many when they get to know how kind-hearted and funny she really is. 

Growing Up with Goals 

      Ms. Delgado was born in Matanzas, Cuba, and immigrated to Florida where she officially started going to school at 5 years old.  

     She is an only child and grew up with both of her parents as well as her many cousins. “We lived in a house that was like a triplex. I lived downstairs, my cousin lived upstairs, and my other cousin lived next to mine on the bottom. All of us grew up together,” she recalls. 

     All of her school friends used to live on the same block as her. On the weekends, they would go out and bike, play video games together, and hang out at a neighbor’s house. Atari and Nintendo had just been released, so they all would play together.  

   Ms. Delgado graduated from Miami High and then she went to Miami Dade College, but later transferred to F.I.U. where she got her bachelor’s degree in social studies education and her master’s degree in educational leadership.  

     She believes she might retire soon because she will be eligible in the next 2 years. However, she says that it depends on the state legislature and the new bills regarding education that might get passed. She doesn’t know what she wants to do after retiring but thinks she might come back to the workforce. 

     Her aspirations towards her children lie with the hopes of her wanting them to be as happy and as successful as they possibly can. “I hope they are also successful career wise, because that means I won’t need to worry for them,” says Ms. Delgado. 

     Like the aspirations she has for her own children, she also wants her students to have some sort of success and a sense of self- worth upon leaving her classroom. “Achievement is different for everyone,” she says.  

   Regarding herself, she hopes that she has accomplished making her students feel good and to help them build some sort of self-esteem, academically and mentally, in her class. She has a strong belief that students our age should try not to be affected by what others perceive us as and that we’re not what we think we are most of the time. She hopes that she’s had some sort of impact on the amount of confidence in her students. 

Life as a Teacher 

      Ms. Delgado believes that her greatest achievement as a teacher is how many years she’s been teaching, even after receiving an award for “Teacher of the Year” not too long ago. She says, “It’s nice to be recognized by your peers, but it wasn’t my personal greatest achievement.” 

     She enjoys being able to teach two subjects, psychology and world history, because every day is a new day to her. She says that no day is like the last, despite the number of years she’s been teaching. That’s what she finds most enjoyable about her career.  

     She also enjoys the different personalities of each of her students, even the shy ones. She thinks they’re a pleasure to work with, and that it’s nice to have students that are very appreciative of the small things she does, even if it’s just lending them a pencil or giving them a piece of chocolate. 

     When she was in 6th grade, she wanted to be an architect. She used to check out books from her local library that contained various blueprints and would study how to make a door. She used to design the insides of houses with the help of these books, which included things such as measurements, windows, and various other interior designs she liked. She says, “I taught myself how to do all of that, and I loved it.”  

     It didn’t work out for her, as the field was math dominated and her capacity for mathematics wasn’t nearly as great as it would need to be to pursue that kind of career. She also tried nursing but realized that she wouldn’t work best in a hospital setting.  

     Further insight into the many years she’s worked as a teacher, Ms. Delgado’s absolute worst memory in her professional life was feeling as if she needed to switch schools, or worse, switch careers, with how burnt-out she was from teaching middle school for nearly 15 years. She says, “I was dreading going to work. I wasn’t having fun, the topics weren’t fun anymore. I was just bored.”  

     After getting her master’s degree, she thought she’d be able to move out from the classroom setting and possibly have something else to do. However, she decided against it. With that, she ended up moving from a middle school setting into a high school setting and loved it.  

   “The kids are more mature. I think they can understand concepts a little bit more, and you could talk to them and have a more mature conversation rather than you can with a middle schooler. They’re very immature,” she says. 

    Ms. Delgado’s fondest memory of the many years of teaching she has had was a field trip she and her students took to the Youth Fair and Busch Gardens. She shared a student’s first time on a roller coaster during these trips, and found it very nice to spend that specific memorable experience with her old student. 

     She believes she’s impacted her students in some way, because year after year Ms. Delgado has students come back to her class to let her know how much fun they had with her as a teacher. Whether they enjoyed the subject she taught or not, seniors have come back and let her know their gratitude despite most being silent or seeming disinterested in the subject she taught.  

Hobbies  

     Outside of teaching, Ms. Delgado enjoys riding her bike. However, she has not been able to cycle in a while due to the place beneath the Metro Rail being closed off due to construction. She also likes to dance and bake for fun. 

     Her favorite TV series are Game of Thrones and Ted Lasso, but she’s not an avid television watcher like her husband and children.  

    She also enjoys a wide variety of books with her favorite genres being psychological thrillers and books based on real stories. She does not enjoy Sci-Fi. Her favorite books are The Light Between Oceans, The Kite Runner, and A Thousand Splendid Suns.  

     Her favorite band now is Bright Eyes, an alternative band. She’s also a big fan of Harry Styles and Taylor Swift. She is currently looking into more artists that suit her taste such as Tyler the Creator and Steve Lacy. 

     More relating to her teaching profession, Ms. Delgado would love to run a club in the school having to do primarily with community service. She says, “Whatever club I would run, I would make sure that they would be doing something in the community.”  

   She goes on to list what they as a club would do, such as helping the elderly with things they cannot do like mowing the lawn, helping around the house ,or getting groceries. She believes that a club should have some sort of positive impact on the community rather than to just have a chill spot to throw a pizza party every other day. 

Fun Facts about Ms. Delgado 

• Her birthday is on January 17th. 

• She has been working as a teacher for 23 years. 

• She used to work as a piñata maker and as a restaurant hostess. 

• Her favorite food is tacos, and her favorite drink is a margarita. 

• She has 3 dogs: Smidge, Tilly and Lily.