Paloma Morales barely spoke during her elementary school years.

The Mexico native could understand her English-speaking classmates at Roswell’s Mimosa Elementary School, but was too intimidated to respond.

“I was afraid they would laugh at me and I didn’t want to speak,” said Paloma, a 16-year-old sophomore at Roswell High School.

After years in the English to Speakers of Other Languages or ESOL program at Mimosa and Crabapple Middle School, Paloma speaks flawless English. Now, she wants to help younger students going through the same struggle. She is one of about 20 Roswell students who tutor Crabapple ESOL students in math.

“I know how hard it is for people who don’t speak English,” said tutor Fatima Flores, a Roswell freshman. “I know how it feels, so I wanted to help.”

The group meets after school every other Thursday in the school’s library. Although math is the subject at hand, the teachers who coordinated the partnership hope to generate friendships between students trying to learn English and those who have succeeded.

Gwen Smith teaches math to Crabapple ESOL students and organized the tutoring sessions.

“They’re really trying,” she said. “They really do their best to stay after school.”

Some parents arrive in taxis to pick up their kids after the sessions, signaling their commitment to their children’s education, Smith said.

Pairing the ESOL students with older, bilingual students, gives the younger ones a safe place to practice their fledgling language skills, she said.

“They’re not threatened with kids who are on a higher level,” Smith said. “Many kids respond to peer tutoring. They like the idea that these are high school students who are coming to help them. It takes away the intimidation.”

Celeste Wesner, a Roswell High School Spanish teacher who drummed up volunteers from her school, hopes the relationships forged in the after-school math sessions will follow the Crabapple students to high school. “These kids will hopefully have a mentor when they get to high school, a friendly face,” she said.

Like schools throughout the metro area, Crabapple Middle is experiencing a steady growth in ESOL students. The school had no students in ESOL in the 1996-97 school year, according to records from the Georgia Department of Education. Nearly 6 percent of the school’s students were in the program last year, records show. Mimosa, which feeds Crabapple, had more than 25 percent of its students in ESOL last year, but Mimosa draws those students from its attendance zone and beyond because it is designated as an ESOL center, said Maria Montalvo-Balbed, the Fulton system’s ESOL coordinator.

Systemwide, 4 percent of Fulton students are in ESOL, but the county has experienced a 394 percent surge in ESOL students over the past decade, Montalvo-Balbed said. Mentoring programs exist for students throughout Fulton, but she applauds the Crabapple-Roswell partnership for its use of older students as tutors.

“We know that kid-to-kid mentoring is very powerful academically,” Montalvo-Balbed said.

The Crabapple ESOL students say they appreciate the help from the older students.

Gabriella Trejo, 13, is working with Fatima, the Roswell freshman. Gabriella, who moved here from Mexico about nine months ago, preferred to speak in Spanish and let Fatima translate during an interview.

“Right now she’s not really understanding the English,” said Fatima, 14, who moved from Mexico about 10 years ago. “I told her when I came to the United States, it was hard for me to speak English. I asked her if she was going through the same thing. She said yes.”



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