Ms. Andrade, tell us how long you have been a teacher, how long you have been at LWHS, and what you do here.

I've been an educator for about 16 years, and here at LWHS for seven. I'm in the science department and I teach biology, behavioral genetics, anthropology, and Music and the Brain.

Did you always know you wanted to be a science teacher?

No! I thought I would go into architecture—very different from the sciences. I come from a first generation family, and because of that background, I didn't really know what to do in general or what my future was going to be. My parents, of course, wanted to be supportive, but they didn't have the equipment or the background to help me prepare.

It was really my teachers who stepped into that role to just even get my younger self to think about college. Growing up with immigrant parents and for a long time, a single mom: we work. That's your future—you're going to work. Thinking about going to college was this new thing. How do you do that? How do you get the money for that?

It wasn't until senior year, when everybody was like, "So what are you going to do?" And I thought, I’ll probably just work. But junior college was an option, so I said, "Okay, I'm not sure what that is, but let's just go".

And I went to junior college and there were more teachers, more professors who immediately saw me, this first generation kid. They swept me under their wings and just kind of let me explore. It was always my teachers who were molding me, helping me, and mentoring me, the whole time.

How did your teachers impact you as an educator?

In high school, Mr. Colon met students where they were. He didn't make you feel bad for not knowing something. He didn't judge you for not turning in a homework assignment. He met us where we were and then allowed us to grow, like molding clay. If I was struggling with something, and he called on me in class, I would say, "Well, can I do it in my way?" He would say, "Yes, absolutely."

That's something I always take with me as an educator. Every student is coming from where they are, and every day is different. I remember how I felt safe to learn. That's what I try to bring to my teaching: to keep that safe learning environment so that students can be curious and grow in their own way.

And then in college, it was Dr. Olga Ramirez. She listened and she brought us in. She was also just so powerful, as this tenured university professor, with all these publications. And when she walked around, people respected her. She would teach through stories and examples. Every time we would go to class, it was this amazing story time. I can still remember her lessons, all these years later. I try to do that now.

What is something you're proud of doing at LWHS?

One of the things I'm proud of is being Mexican in the science department. Sometimes I do get a sense of pride when I meet parents or other people who are a little shocked when I say, "Hi, I'm Claudia, I'm in the science department." It's just not expected. Doing research to see how many Mexicanas are in the sciences, the numbers are very low. And even lower for how many science educators are Mexican. To be in the science department and to be a proud Chicana, I'm very proud of that.

As for in class with my students, one example is the Gene Culture Co-Evolution unit. We look at the last 15,000-5,000 years, at how culture has actually changed us. We look at the human diet and how food from all over the world has changed human genetics. And then we cook. Students have to cook using (as much as possible) the ingredients and the techniques that would have been used during that time.

If there wasn't any salt available to that culture, they're not going to use salt. If there wasn't any flour, they're not going to use flour. But if there were grains available, I have stone grinders, so they'll use those. One of the outcomes is that students see what it used to take to survive: it took an enormous amount of work just to eat. It's an eye-opening experience to see that back then, it took an enormous amount of collaboration, community, and cultural knowledge from hundreds of thousands of years just to survive.

And then we have the discussion about evolutionary history, and how at any point, we could have just not existed, but we're here. What have we become in all that time? And then where do we want to go? Putting evolution in that huge context helps students understand the development that got us here.