Author: Karyna Cheung

  • Book drive helps diversify what students are reading

    Karyna Cheung

    Sarah Novogrodsky. A library display of the AAPI book drive donations.

    Zhiqiang Fang ventured into the library during an open house at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School, where his younger son is a student. After weaving through several shelves, he found what he was looking for: a few of the many books he helped donate to the school, marked by bookplate stickers on the inside cover he had a hand in designing.

    Fang, president of the Chinese American Association of Cambridge, grabbed his son to show him the bookplates displaying the years they were added to the collection.

    “It crossed a few couple of years, one book from one year and another book from another year. Exciting for me at that time,” Fang said. “I kind of felt proud.”

    Fang and the CAAC are responsible for adding more than 2,000 books centered on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) to the libraries of the 17 public schools in Cambridge through their annual AAPI book drive, now in its fifth year. 

    The CAAC formed following the March 2021 Atlanta spa shootings, where six of the eight victims were of Asian descent. The book drive has been a staple of the association from the start; when it began, it drew inspiration from other groups, including Belmont’s Chinese American Association and One Book One World in Chicago. Neither of those groups has held one since 2022; the Cambridge association is in its fifth.

    Fundraising cycles have varied. Sponsors and individual donors raised over $12,000 for the inaugural book drive in 2021-22, distributing nearly 1,000 books to 33 schools in Cambridge and Somerville. Final totals have been smaller in following cycles, ranging between roughly $5,000 and $8,000. More money raised means more books for the libraries.

    Since its current fundraising cycle started in May, the CAAC has amassed only $4,000, half its fundraising goal, and the drive ends in a few weeks.

    “I want more folks [to] get involved,” Fang said. “But I don’t really know how.”

    Sarah Novogrodsky. CPS Director of Library Media Services Sarah Novogrodsky and CAAC President Zhiqiang Fang holding up copies of Kelly Yang’s book, 2025.

    When the book drive starts, librarians across the district request books they want to add to their shelves, which can depend on each school’s student demographics, said Sarah Novogrodsky, CPS director of library media services. Those books are then compiled into a wishlist she sends back to the CAAC. Once fundraising is done in February, the money is distributed to the schools to buy the books they selected, in time for library displays at the start of May to commemorate AAPI Heritage Month. Last year, the funds were also used to invite Asian American author Kelly Yang to visit the school libraries.

    This cycle’s list includes 39 titles with dozens of AAPI backgrounds represented and encompasses picture books, graphic novels, prose novels and biographies. 

    A few of the authors on the wishlist are local to Massachusetts, including writer Rajani LaRocca, whose books center on Desi characters. She said she did not see many children’s books focused on Indian American characters, so she started writing them herself and published her first in 2019. LaRocca called her book on the list, “Some of Us,” a celebration of immigrants and their contributions.

    “This past year or so, it’s just been kind of hard to deal with everything that’s been going on in the news,” said LaRocca, who immigrated from India with her family and became a naturalized citizen at 15 years old. “But I’m just glad that this book exists, and I’m so honored and glad that it will get into the hands of kids.”

    The MLK School’s largest student demographics are Asian and multi-race, and it hosts a Chinese immersion program. Its library might have more books with AAPI characters, subjects or authors to better reflect the school population. Where other schools with a smaller Asian population may not have as many of those books, the CAAC’s book drive helps fill those gaps in those collections.

    “All these kids are coming from lots and lots of different lived realities,” Novogrodsky said. “It’s really powerful … to be able to just go to the shelves and put that book in the kid’s hand.” 

    The book drive has several individual donors, but fundraising efforts are typically led by sponsors. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a frequent large donor alongside local business owners, including Mike Park, the broker at Splice Realty in Cambridge. Park has sponsored nearly every book drive.

    Sarah Novogrodsky. CAAC President Zhiqiang Fang with a shipment of books donated by the AAPI book drive, 2025.

    “It’s good for everyone to have their culture and heritage chronicled or written down and visible,” Park said.

    The book drive’s impact has trickled down to parents like Cheryl Sadeli Franco. Her children are half-Indonesian Chinese and attend the MLK school, and she has made an effort in her own book collection at home to emphasize that side of their heritage.

    “We’re trying to raise them just to be appreciative of each culture. They’re still young at this point,” Franco said. “We’re just very grateful that the people are really nice and inclusive and welcoming, and what we teach them at home is not so much different from what they get in school … They don’t know it yet, but I know it.”

    The past four book drives have yielded over 2,240 books combined. Fang takes pride in the books the CAAC has put in Cambridge’s school libraries, but the work he has done does not feel significant, he said. Looking at his son’s school library and the thousands of books it holds, only a fraction came from the book drive. 

    “We spend a lot of effort to fundraise, to run the book drive,” Fang said. “In terms of the library itself, it’s still a small effort, a very small portion of the book collection.”

    This story is part of a partnership between Cambridge Day and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • Beyond war: Naja Pham Lockwood gathers her refugee stories

    When Naja Pham Lockwood was seven years old, she stole a plastic water canteen from another little girl as she boarded a US Navy ship. It was 1975, and her family was one of many fleeing Vietnam following the fall of Saigon.

    “I need for you to run over to that girl and take her water canteen. She’s not going to make it,” Lockwood remembered her father telling her. “You need to survive.”

    Lockwood and her family made it to Massachusetts as refugees that July, and they settled in Worcester. She brought her history with her and that was valuable when she wrote her bachelor’s thesis at Boston University on Ho Chi Minh and the politics of modern-day Vietnam.

    “Maybe because there were no Vietnamese around me, I really searched for my identity on so many levels,” she said. As a student, she volunteered in Cambridge at the Phillips Brooks House Association. Now living in Utah, Lockwood works with the governor to support refugees.

    Fifty years, two degrees, and two successful careers in investment banking and film production later, Lockwood has directed her own film, which explores the consequences of the Vietnam War for survivors and the refugee experience for emigrants now living in America.

    “Đất lành, chim đậu (On healing land, birds perch),” which was screened on April 27 at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library as part of the Vietnamese community’s Black April commemoration, centers narratively on Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams’s Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph, “Saigon Execution.” It depicts Nguyễn Ngọc Loan shooting Viet Cong captain Nguyễn Văn Lém in the head during the 1968 Tet offensive, in which Viet Cong soldiers launched multiple attacks on South Vietnamese civilians and troops.

    The first time Lockwood saw the photo as a young girl, she couldn’t sleep for weeks. “Every year during the fall of Vietnam … that photo would be shown on television,” she said. “I had the entire room lit up while I was sleeping.”

    Her father, who had worked in intelligence for USAID, would sit her down and tell her stories to reassure her that the photo had a happy ending. He told her the Viet Cong captain, Văn Lém, had murdered most of a family earlier in the day before the photo was taken, but one of the children had survived and made his way to the United States – Huan Nguyen, who much later became the first Vietnamese American to achieve the rank of rear admiral in the US Navy.

    “All throughout my life, I thought about the photo,” Lockwood said. “I thought about the people involved.”

    She began tracking down and setting up interviews with the children of the two men featured in “Saigon Execution” roughly a year ago. She also interviewed Huan because she wanted to focus on the trauma and pain that survivors of the war continually suffer from, and on the journey he and the soldiers’ children took to move forward from Adams’s photo.

    “This event is more than a remembrance. It is a celebration of who we are and all we have achieved,” Huan said in a recorded statement before the film began. “Today’s reflections are not just memories of the past. They are bridges between generations.”

    Throughout the film, Huan reflects on his survivor’s guilt and the continuing pain and loss from the war. Although the children’s fathers were on different sides of the war, June, the general’s daughter, dealt with questions about her father being a “killer” as a child growing up in the US, while Loan and Thong Nguyễn faced the same dilemma with Huan’s story, whose family members their father allegedly killed. 

    “At the end of the day, there are no winners in war. All sides lose,” Lockwood said. She was compelled to create the film 10 years ago because of the “tremendous trauma” she witnessed during the 40th anniversary.

    “Refugees didn’t have time to even focus to heal, because they were so busy just trying to survive,” Lockwood said. “I think it’s this generation, their children, who are telling their stories.”

    Following the film screening, there was a panel discussion with Lockwood, community organizer Kevin Lam, and faculty member Vũ Diễm Hương moderated by Linh-Phương Vũ, co-director of 1975: A Vietnamese Diaspora Commemoration Initiative, which organized the event. There was also the opportunity for audience questions.

    Chhenlee Ly, 31, asked how he could tell his parents’ stories as a second-generation immigrant. His father was a refugee fleeing the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, and his mother and grandmother emigrated from Vietnam in the 1970s as refugees. His wife had mentioned the screening and suggested they go.

    “Honestly, I wasn’t even going to ask any questions or anything,” Ly said. He had choked up when he stood up to speak, and tears were still in his eyes. “I wonder if I should ask more.”

    Many who attended the screening said they hoped to start investigating their own family histories and learn more about their parents’ stories. Margot Delogne, whose father died in Vietnam during the war, now runs the 2 Sides Project, a nonprofit that organizes trips overseas for children whose fathers died on both sides of the war.

    “I actually didn’t read carefully what the film was about,” Delogne said. “The thing about this war and thinking you’re the only one who is impacted by it, when you start looking out of yourself and asking questions … there’s much more to the story.”

    Lockwood hopes she can continue to tell stories that look past known history and delve deeper into stories of heritage. The name of the film, “Đất lành, chim đậu” derives from a Vietnamese proverb that states that “birds, like humans, will live in peace and in fertile land, and they will settle there when the land is peaceful.” At the end of the film, Huan invokes the proverb to express the journey to reconcile his past with the rest of his life.

    “I’m really interested in stories about, how do we move beyond war, as children of war?” Lockwood asked. “I think it’s just part of my DNA.”

    This story is part of a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • Peace Institute, NU class offer forum to survivors in unsolved homicides

    Clementina Chéry, president and CEO of the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute, asked Northeastern University law professor Andrew Haile and his first-year law class last fall if they could look into police responses to survivors’ requests for information on unsolved cases involving their loved ones.

    After six months of research and interviewing survivors, law enforcement officials, and legal experts, Haile and his students ascertained that the Boston Police Department’s treatment of unsolved homicide cases and victims’ loved ones could be improved by clarifying protocols, establishing partnerships, and re-establishing communication with survivors. They recently presented their findings to a crowded room in Northeastern’s Dockser Hall, with some survivors in attendance.

    “Our goal today is to amplify the voices of survivors of unsolved homicides and to start a conversation about survivors’ rights in the Boston area in a positive update,” said law student Camila Clavijo.

    The presentation covered the history and the current state of affairs with the Boston Police Department’s Unsolved Case Squad, which was established in 1991 in response to an alarming increase in homicides in the city. The students found that the squad today faces a backlog of more than 1,700 unsolved homicide cases and that community trust in Boston’s police force, particularly for Black Bostonians, has historically been low.

    “Excessive surveillance and searches in historically Black communities have shaped the nature of BPD’s presence in these neighborhoods, which may undermine the work of the Unsolved Case Squad,” Clavijo said, citing a Harvard study that found that Black Bostonians reported a “deep distrust” in law enforcement.

    The students found that 70 percent of Boston’s homicides over the last 10 years had occurred in Dorchester, Mattapan and Roxbury and that those neighborhoods also reported the highest concentration of cases with no arrests.

    The class report suggested that partnerships with universities could streamline the Unsolved Case Squad’s administrative responsibilities to allow detectives to focus on investigations. They also recommended creating clearer department protocols for transferring cases.

    Throughout the report and the follow-up presentation, six survivors whose loved ones’ cases have been unsolved for more than a decade provided their testimonies. In these interviews, survivors recounted that police communication regarding their unsolved cases has been consistently inadequate.

    Law student Nathan Beagal said the Case Squad contacts families only for major updates in cases to avoid “reopening emotional wounds, jeopardizing trial outcomes, and triggering false reports if case information spreads publicly.”

    The class’s recommendations on communication included establishing a firm schedule of communication with survivors, creating a “frequently asked questions” page, and publishing an unsolved homicides database and annual homicide clearance report.

    Haile’s classes and the Peace Institute have collaborated on previous projects. The first proposal Chéry made to Haile was an investigation of the murder of her son, Louis Brown, for whom the institute is named. Louis was 15 years old when he was killed in 1993 in a crossfire between two groups while he was on his way to a Christmas party. Chéry founded the Peace Institute a year later, and its first programs focused on educating young people about how to process grief and trauma through non-violent means.

    Unsolved class NE Rosa Caban photo REP 15-25.png
    Northeastern University law students and guests are shown during a March discussion at the university’s Dockser Hall about unsolved homicide cases in Boston’s neighborhoods.   Rosa Cabán photo

    A man named Charles Bogues pleaded guilty to Brown’s murder in 1997, but 15 years later, he filed motions to rescind his guilty plea, claiming that that he did not kill Brown, that he was induced into confessing by prosecutors. Chéry, who had reconciled with Bogues while he was in prison, found that she had questions that no one would answer after Bogues’s statements.

    “What I struggled with is what happened to the other groups that were shooting that day,” Chéry said, “and only one person got convicted? And so for me, it just didn’t seem that it was justice.”

    While Chéry was searching for someone to re-evaluate the events surrounding her son’s killing, Haile, who lives in Dorchester near the Peace Institute, was looking for a community partner for his law class.

    “She has been a longstanding voice for justice and peace and activism around criminal justice,” Haile said. “So, we partnered with her.”
    Haile said Northeastern’s law program emphasizes “community lawyering” — meaning prioritizing listening to a community client’s concerns and looking for the legal tools that will best suit their case.

    Following their report on Louis Brown’s killing in 2023, which also included recommendations to improve the criminal justice system, Chéry provided Haile’s next class with a new project: looking into survivors’ difficulty accessing public funding to pay for funeral and medical expenses. The presentation on unsolved cases is the third collaboration between the Peace Institute and Haile’s class.

    The next issue Chéry wants the class to address is the lack of information that families of homicide victims encounter regarding wrongful convictions in their loved ones’ cases and plea bargains, which often result in shorter prison sentences for suspects who are guilty.

    In January, legislators on Beacon Hill filed bills related to unsolved homicides and survivors. A bill presented by state Sen. Liz Miranda proposes a new state office to handle unsolved homicides, a task force to handle these cases, and the establishment of a state-wide database, the last a suggestion of the law students.“There’s no one checking in with us to make sure our rights are being adhered to and respected,” Chéry said. “What we will be doing across the state is working to make sure that our voices are heard.”

    This story is part of a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • The 50th anniversary of ‘Black April’ centers memories for many in Vietnamese community

    “I am who I am and where I am because of Black April,” says Tran Vu of Dorchester.
    Reporter file photo

    Vietnamese community organizations are organizing the largest commemoration in Boston for the 50th anniversary of what has become known as “Black April” while continuing their push for a permanent memorial in Dorchester to uplift their voices in presenting Vietnam War narratives.

    It was on April 30, 1975, that North Vietnamese troops marched into Saigon, the name at the time of the capital city of South Vietnam, effectively ending a war involving American armed forces that had ravaged the country for a decade and more. For many Vietnamese, the collapse of their government left them no option but to flee the country and seek safety in the United States.

    Tran Vu, director of “1975: A Vietnamese Diaspora Commemoration Initiative” and a primary organizer of the commemoration, was one of many Vietnamese-born refugees who settled in Boston.

    “I am who I am and where I am because of Black April,” said Tran, whose father had fought in the war and had been sent to North Vietnamese reeducation camps before they found a path to the United States as political refugees. “Bringing this work to the public and to really be a part of the long-term vision is definitely an honor and a privilege.”

    The Dorchester-based group will host a commemoration event on Sat., April 26, from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. at Boston College High School, 150 Morrissey Blvd. The event is free, but registration is required. Go to BostonLittleSaigon.org for more info. The event will be live-streamed here.

    Tran is also involved in “Journey of Light,” a visual illustration that she created using nón lá, traditional Vietnamese conical hats that are suspended in the air, creating a space where, Tran hopes, visitors can “both experience and see the impact of the war’s legacy.” She has done variations of the installation in the past.

    Events following the Saturday commemoration at BC High will include a film screening for a documentary by a local Vietnamese filmmaker and a bilingual panel discussion at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum on Sunday, April 27 at 2 p.m. Go to jfklibrary.org to register.

    The day will also feature two flag raising ceremonies— one at Boston City Hall Plaza at 11:30 a.m. and another at the Dorchester Vietnam Veterans Memorial at 1:30 in the afternoon.

    Tran has been among those advocating for a permanent war memorial that includes Vietnamese perspectives in a section of Fields Corner’s Town Field. She spoke recently at a public hearing about allocating funding for the memorial in the city’s construction budget.

    Five other organizations, including Boston Little Saigon, have been involved in organizing both 50th anniversary events. “We’re all working collaboratively so that we can continue to amplify our community and really preserve our history and cultural narrative,” Tran said.

    This story is part of a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • City tells aggrieved resident that it will address intersection safety in Codman Sq.

    Dean Toulan and city officials take the measure of things at the intersection of Washington and Armandine streets on March 11. Karyna Cheung photo

    Dean Toulan hit the new crosswalk button at Armandine and Washington streets that was installed by the city in the Codman Square neighborhood a few weeks ago and waited for the signal to change.

    The crosswalk has special meaning for Toulan, a resident of Armandine Street, who months ago sent a message to city government about his concerns for pedestrian safety after he was nearly hit by a driver trying to run a red light at the corner in November. The fact that there was no button on one side of the crossing was one safety issue that Toulan cited in a series of emails to city officials.

    Toulan spoke to The Dorchester Reporter in February about the lack of pedestrian infrastructure along the Washington Street corridor, which is used as a thoroughfare by students, parents and children at TechBoston Academy, the Dorchester YMCA, Roberts Playground and Ashmont Nursery School, where a driver alleged to have had an invalid license, a loaded gun, and drugs in his vehicle crashed into the side of the building in January. 

    Days after The Reporter published the article on pedestrian safety, including Toulan’s complaints, a city neighborhood liaison contacted the newspaper to connect with him. Now, the city has proposed fixing the issues he raised over time, beginning with minor tweaks and escalating toward major changes.

    “I think a lot of people don’t know where to start, or they feel overwhelmed, and even if you get to a certain point, what if you don’t send the invite?” Toulan said. “What if that doesn’t happen because I didn’t push?”

    Members of the Office of Neighborhood Services and other city officials, including City Councilor Brian Worrell, joined Toulan for a site walk on March 11 to examine intersections along the corridor and determine what to do.

    They suggested the work would begin with simple improvements, such as repainting crosswalks and installing new signage if needed. More significant improvements, such as traffic signaling changes, would need to involve multiple city departments. Major changes — curb bump-outs, new traffic islands on the road — would come last.

    Toulan said he is optimistic that the city is willing to move forward on the project, but it took months of emails and receiving minimal responses before there was any significant movement. Following the article and the city’s initial contact with him, Toulan emailed multiple times before finally inviting officials to a site walk.

    The Office of Neighborhood Services did not respond to The Reporter’s repeated requests for an interview. Toulan has yet to receive a formal message about what the government will do next, but he hopes the city will act quickly — not for his sake, but for the elderly and young children who use the crosswalks daily to get from one place to the next.

    “It’s about safety and making an ideal environment for that volume of foot traffic,” Toulan said.  “Why not just do it all right, once? Why do it halfway? And I think that this is an area that deserves a lot more than halfway, because we’re not even getting that.”

    •••

    A walk along Washington Street; a near miss at Armandine

    The first thing Dean Toulan points out are two spots on the road flanking Armandine Street. There used to be pylons to discourage drivers from cutting too close to the sidewalks.“It’s actually better that they’re not there anymore,” he said. “They’re just going to get run over again.”

    What hasn’t been replaced and should be, Toulan said, are the words painted in white that are meant to alert drivers: “20 MPH SLOW ZONE.” The paint on the road was not redone after Armandine Street was uprooted to install a natural gas line. That project also stripped the crosswalk of half of its paint.

    Toulan gestures to a bus stop that two cars are using as parking spaces. The stop, which services the students and elderly in the area who take the No. 26 bus, is marked by a weathered wooden bench. There is no bus shelter. As we wait for the crosswalk light to change, one of the cars pulls out of the stop and drives away. Less than 30 seconds later, another car takes its place. 

    Toulan said that the bus has to stop in the middle of the road to pick up passengers. There is nowhere else for it to go.
    He continues one block down Washington Street, stopping in front of the Ashmont Nursery School at the Ashmont Street intersection. There are plywood boards covering the side where a driver ran through the building in January.

    As we make our way back to Washington and Armandine, Toulan is talking about a bus stop that was never replaced when he breaks off mid-sentence and lunges toward the crosswalk, grabbing the shoulder of a boy on a scooter and stopping him from riding into the path of a red sedan making a curving turn onto Armandine, barely stopping.

    The boy’s mother, another kid beside her and one more in a stroller, catches up to her son. Toulan waved off her thanks and the family continued on through the intersection. He sighed, shook his head, and spots one of his neighbors and waves, pointing at the traffic.

    They laugh about it. It’s just another day.

    This story is part of a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • BPS offers pipelines to classrooms for would-be ESL, special education teachers

    Melvin Caballero was once a boy picking coffee fields with his 10 siblings in Honduras while dreaming of an opportunity to pursue his passion to become an educator. Against the odds, he hitchhiked to America alone, found a family to sponsor him in Boston, graduated from high school and college, and went to work for his alma mater, Boston International High School, as a paraprofessional.

    Now, Caballero is on his way to becoming a licensed teacher through the Boston Public Schools’ Teacher Pipeline programs.

    For substitute teachers, paraprofessionals, or even career changers aspiring to become licensed educators in Massachusetts, a Pipeline Program could be the answer. Established in 2018, they aim to increase the diversity of teaching staff across the district and license more educators to teach English as a second language or work with students with moderate disabilities.

    “We’re a very multilingual district,” said Rashaun Martin, managing director of recruitment, cultivation and diversity programs at BPS. “If we have people who are licensed and teaching English as a second language, and working with those students, that’s highly beneficial. And as the district moves along with its inclusive education model, we also want as many educators as possible to be licensed in [special education].”

    The BPS Teacher Pipeline consists of three programs:

    •The Bilingual Educators/Accelerated Community to Teaching Program offers coaching and classes to prepare participants for provisional licensing tests. Despite the name, prospective candidates do not need to be bilingual.

    •The BPS Teaching Fellowship, for which Caballero is a candidate, enables participants to obtain more advanced licenses to teach ESL and moderately disabled students.

    •The Bilingual Inclusive Education Teacher Residency, a four-to-five-year program that aims to convert bilingual paraeducators or career changers into permanent BPS teachers of record with an endorsement in bilingual education and a master’s in inclusive education. BPS is offering the program for the first time for the 2025-26 school year.

    BPS data show that nearly one in two students speaks a language other than English at home. Roughly half of BPS staff are white, compared to 14.2 percent of students. The large proportion of multilingual, diverse students should be reflected in the teacher workforce, Martin said.

    This year, the BE/ACTT program has 44 enrolled candidates, 26 of whom are bilingual. There are 38 full-time teachers in the teaching fellowship, 70 percent of whom are educators of color. 

    “We’re always in the business of trying to recruit educators into the district,” Martin said. “The future of our teaching force may be sitting right here in the community.”

    When Caballero entered the country, his family helped connect him with another household in Boston that would sponsor and support him with a few conditions. One of them was for him to get a formal education.

    Caballero attended Boston International High School in Dorchester, a Boston Public School that “embraces immigrant English learners and their families,” learning English as he worked toward a high school diploma. After graduating in 2012, he earned his bachelor’s degree in education from Bridgewater State University.

    “Nobody in my family had achieved anything greater than sixth grade, and I wanted to become a role model not only for my brothers but for my nephews and my family to see that education is a good thing,” Caballero said.

    In 2020, he joined the team at his alma mater as a paraprofessional. He teaches ninth-grade science and classes for students like his young self, who began high school as English learners with limited previous formal education. He began training for an initial license in ESL this year through the Fellowship program as a BPS teacher of record for multilingual students.

    “I wanted to become more involved in ESL and helping students who, just like me, came to the States not knowing the language,” Caballero said.

    “Having an ESL license will definitely give me the opportunity to work either as an ESL teacher or supporting an ESL classroom.”

    The BE/ACTT is the first-year program within the Teacher Pipeline that provides coursework and counseling to support aspiring teachers. Through the free, 12-month program, candidates are prepped to take the Massachusetts Tests for Educator Licensure and earn a Sheltered English Immersion Endorsement, which teaches them to incorporate English learning into their classes for English language learners.

    All Massachusetts teachers are required to pass the MTELs in their chosen subject areas to become licensed. A few subjects include bilingual education, early childhood education, and secondary math and science.

    Both Caballero and Henderson Elementary School teacher Phibe Pham-Smallwood, who has completed the BE/ACTT program and Teaching Fellowship, praised the counseling support and mentorship they have received, which they both believe helped them to improve as teachers.

    “[My practitioner] comes to my classroom, she visits and she observes my lessons, and after she gives me feedback on how I am doing, what areas I could get better in, and I feel that has been a huge part,” Caballero said. “It has been a great experience to have somebody who has more experience and more knowledge sharing that with me and guiding me.”

    Caballero and Pham-Smallwood also said that the MTEL classes were essential as bilingual individuals who previously struggled with the reading and writing portions of the exams. 

    “I passed my [communication and literacy MTEL] because they saw what I needed help in. They prepped me for it,” Pham-Smallwood said. “That program was out there to prepare me, not only for my classroom, but for me to succeed.”

    As the child of immigrant parents, Pham-Smallwood was inspired by her mother, a Vietnam refugee who could not access a formal education when she was younger. Like Caballero, Pham-Smallwood is a BPS alumna and now teaches 4th grade at the Henderson Inclusion School. The classroom she works in is a mix of general and special education students, and she focuses on accommodating special education needs to the curriculum. She obtained her licenses through the BE/ACTT program and the Teaching Fellowship.

    The Teaching Fellowship is a free, accelerated one-year program for teachers of record to become licensed to teach ESL or special education.

    “Even as adults, we’re still learning like the students are learning, and you don’t want to give up,” Pham-Smallwood said. “What I want, I just got to push harder.”

    Pham-Smallwood grew up in Dorchester and South Boston. Even though she didn’t attend the school she works at now, she said the pipeline helps promote a teaching force that understands the areas students grow up in.

    “We’re from here, we live in the city, and they’re looking for teachers who understand the kids, and that’s what the pipeline is really focused on,” Pham-Smallwood said. “Teachers who are authentic with themselves and with the community.”

    Whether they’re currently paraprofessionals, recent education degree graduates, or even people working in office cubicles, Martin said he believed there are future teachers in the community who need the opportunity that the Teacher Pipeline Programs offer.

    “A lot of people out there would make great teachers. They just may not know how to go about it,” Martin said. ‘This is a really great way for us to be able to support people in that process.”

    The Teacher Pipeline Programs are now accepting applications until April 11, which can be found at teachboston.org.

    This story is part of a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • Frustrations abound over T silence on rehab of Mattapan trolley line

    The trolley rumbles up to the Ashmont/Peabody Square platform on a shallow incline before it creaks and rattles to a stop at the eastern terminal of the Mattapan Line. The doors open squeakily to let out a stream of passengers.

    New riders heading toward Mattapan take their place. The car shudders into movement and screeches slowly around the looped track, descending swiftly onto its route again.

    State Rep. Brandy Fluker-Reid, who represents parts of Dorchester, Mattapan, and the town of Milton, said the Mattapan Hi-Speed Line, which runs on a 2.6-mile loop through those neighborhoods, is like a “roller coaster.” She wasn’t the only one with that thought in mind.

    “I’ve never been a fan of it. It just looks outdated,” said Chichi Hernandez, an employee at Sweet Life Bakery and Cafe in Lower Mills. She used to commute on the trolley 10 years ago from Ashmont to the Milton Station stop. Today, she drives. “It makes me a little nervous.”

    The Mattapan Line is the last MBTA rapid transit line still using Presidents’ Conference Committee streetcars, which were introduced in the city in 1937. The last of these vehicles on the Green Line were retired in 1985, but the Mattapan trolleys have been running continuously for more than 80 years and are the oldest PCC cars still in service in the country.

    The MBTA laid out significant changes planned for the Mattapan Line in March 2018, starting with a refurbishment of the remaining serviceable PCC cars. Alongside these developments, the T introduced proposals in 2019 to bring the line’s eight stations up to ADA standards and revamp infrastructure while laying the groundwork to bring Type 9 light rail cars currently used on the Green Line to the Mattapan Line within the next 8 to 10 years. 

    Most recently, in March 2024, engineers were seeking permits to drill “exploratory borings” along the tracks to prepare the transition to Type 9 cars, which require less maintenance and can transport 212 passengers per car (PCCs can carry up to 130 riders). A year later, those Type 9s are nowhere in sight.

    The project is in its eighth year this month. Only two of the nine PCC cars have been redone, far behind schedule.

    Legislators, including Fluker-Reid and state Sen. Bill Driscoll, and some of their constituents are frustrated with how long plans are taking, coupled with a seeming lack of explanation from the T.

    “It’s clearly not a priority for the MBTA. That is evident in the fact that […] we don’t know what’s going on,” Driscoll said. “If workers were actually being posted and tasked with doing the work, I have a hard time believing that it would take this long.”

    The MBTA invested $127 million into refurbishments and the transformation combined, a total that has not changed since 2018. With potential changes in funding availability and the consistent project delays, Driscoll wondered whether the ongoing projects will cost hundreds of millions of dollars or if the money still exists.

    “It’s a real concern because of how long these delays are continuing. That money could go elsewhere or evaporate.” Driscoll said. “I think the T really needs to be the one to answer that question.”

    When plans were first announced, the MBTA aimed to complete refurbishments on its current trolley cars by 2020. Driscoll, whose constituency resides in Milton, said the MBTA “reset” its timeline on the project in 2022 following delays caused by the pandemic, unforeseen lead paint removal, and the complexity of the refurbishment. The first revamped trolley went into service in spring 2022, followed by a second in the summer. The T promised a new trolley every five to six months, but the remaining seven have not been updated.

    “[In 2022], there were MBTA officials saying, ‘We know we need to repair the relationship here with the ridership and constituency and elected officials and that we haven’t lived up to commitments. Going forward, this is the reset,’” Driscoll said. “It has not happened.”

    When Driscoll requested an update on the refurbishments after the Neponset River flooded Milton Station in February and disabled two trolleys, he did not receive an immediate response.

    Within the reset, the MBTA promised quarterly updates for legislators whose constituencies live along the line and biannual public community meetings. The MBTA hosted its last public meeting on the transformation project in June 2023 and does not have another scheduled in 2025. Both Driscoll and Fluker-Reid confirmed they last met with the organization in June 2024 and have not confirmed a new meeting.

    Fluker-Reid recalled that the MBTA took legislators on-site to see trolley refurbishments in action at the start of the reset, compared to the current lack of updates.

    “In that meeting and that site visit, we received quality information in terms of what was happening,” she said. “It seems as though our information became less clear as the project became further behind in timeline.”

    Before her time in office, Fluker-Reid said there was talk in community meetings as early as 2012 about the possibility of Type 9 light rail cars replacing the PCCs. The timeline then was also 8 to 10 years for the project. With continual delays, Fluker-Reid said, she and some of her constituents now wonder whether refurbishing the trolleys is still worth the time or money. New parts for the trolleys are difficult to obtain because of the age of the vehicles.

    “The community has been of the impression that these [Type 9] lines would be here […] And even when having done the reset, they still have not met the deadlines that they articulated,” she said. “It’s really hard to build community trust and establish credibility when they say that this is the new timeline, and then they fail to meet the benchmarks of said timeline.”

    Former Lower Mills resident Linda Lewi, once a regular commuter on the Mattapan trolley from the Milton Station stop, said she felt that upgrading the line was a “second thought” to the MBTA. When the T demolished the decrepit Adams Street stairwell at Milton Station in 2023 to begin making the station ADA compliant, Milton community leaders expressed long-held frustration on how little the MBTA had committed to improving the stop; they claimed the stairwell had been in disrepair for a decade and the demolition plan would only make poor conditions worse. The town had sued the MBTA the year prior on the issue.

    “The MBTA clearly had absolutely no intention to do anything,” Lewi said, calling conversations at community meetings “circular.” “And nobody can ever give a good reason why it’s so slow.”

    In its last community meeting – in June 2023 – on the Mattapan transformation project, the MBTA said that an accessible sloped walkway was in “early planning and design.” The old entrance to the stairwell on Adams Street remains unchanged today, with access blocked off. Passengers have to walk across the neighboring Extra Space Storage parking lot to reach the platforms from Adams Street.

    Regardless of setbacks with the transformation, some riders have fond memories of the 1940s PCCs. Dorchester resident Kathy Glynn remembered hopping on the trolleys for fun or to get around the city while growing up in Jamaica Plain. She was also open to a newer system for the Mattapan Line.

    “The important thing is that there’s a connectivity and that the schedule is such that it runs frequently enough,” she said, adding that there needed to be enough infrastructure at stops for passengers. “Other than that, I don’t have a problem if they change the style.”

    Robert Cromwell, who is 78, has been riding the Mattapan trolley for as long as he can remember. As for getting him to his destination, he says the current cars work well enough.

    “I look at the things that I can change, the things I can’t change,” he said. “If I didn’t like it, then what would be one of the reasons? Is it not going to my stop? Yeah, it goes to Mattapan Station. Is it frequent? Pretty much.”

    As project delays have piled up, Fluker-Reid and Driscoll have continually questioned the T on what will happen to the Mattapan Line. Before his more recent update request, Driscoll wrote to MBTA General Manager Phillip Eng and MassDOT Secretary Monica Tibbits-Nut in February 2024, asking whether the T was committed to completing Mattapan Line-related projects, because communication had returned to “relative silence.” He said he did not get a clarifying response. 

    In response to the Dorchester Reporter’s request for an update, the MBTA wrote that it was “committed to delivering safe, reliable, and improved service for the public across all our modes.” 

    The statement continued, “We fully and deeply understand how important the Mattapan Line is to the community and have been assessing the Mattapan Transformation effort to date to determine how best to move this project forward. We thank the community for their patience in allowing us the necessary time to ensure the next public meeting will provide sufficient information that demonstrates our commitment.”

    During her first term, Fluker-Reid sat on the Legislature’s Joint Transportation Committee. During an oversight hearing in 2023, she invited Eng to ride and experience the trolley to highlight the importance of the ongoing projects. Though an MBTA liaison said that Eng would be open to taking the trolley, he has not yet accepted the offer.

    Fluker-Reid noted that Mattapan and Dorchester residents often feel “forgotten” by large organizations like the MBTA because of the slow, uncertain progress on projects meant to benefit predominantly Black and Brown neighborhoods.

    “We all want what’s best for our community,” she said. “It’s an outdated system that is somewhat dilapidated; it does not meet the needs of modern day travel and transit; and this community deserves and needs something better.”

    This story derives from a partnership between the Dorchester Reporter and the Boston University Department of Journalism.