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DAVID CHA
Teacher, Warren High School
David Cha has been a high school Social Studies and AVID teacher at Warren High School for 20 years. He is passionate about serving his community, doing ministry on Skid Row and helping Korean Americans get more politically involved. As the senior class AVID teacher, he is committed to helping low-income high school seniors get into colleges.
So you grew up in Koreatown. What were you like growing up?
When my family moved to Koreatown in the mid ‘80s, my younger brother and I joined a Filipino gang. Joining a gang was just what everyone in Koreatown did after the dancing phase at the time, you know? But when I became a Christian shortly after, I said I was out. And they never jumped me out. And when you get jumped into a gang, you know you have to get jumped out. I never went through that. So I said okay, maybe they just don’t wanna touch me. And I turned my life around. You know, grades were pretty good, I became senior class president, I went to UCSD, published an article for the LA Times, got on national TV twice by my freshman year in college. And I was one of those kids that got bussed out from LA to the Valley for integration, which wasn't welcomed by everyone in the valley. So for a kid who bussed out, that was a pretty big deal for me to have all those accolades. So I was living this Christian life and grabbing hold of the American dream. Then I got a call one day in my sophomore year from my youth pastor who told me my brother got locked up and that he was being tried, which eventually led to him serving nine years. How’d you feel when that happened? I saw that you and your brother were featured on Good Morning America as an example of how different siblings can be. When my youth pastor drove my mother to the court in those excruciating months before my brother was officially sentenced and spent time encouraging my mother, that's when I realized all the good things I did was only to benefit myself. They were for my glory. It was like me saying “Look at what I was able to achieve as an immigrant! Look at me!” But it was all pomp and self-righteousness, because I didn't care much about my own brother or my parents back home. It was all about me. In fact, when my brother once told me it was hard to change his life around, and he really did try through martial arts, I just looked at him judgmentally and told him he was just not trying hard enough. And I offered no encouragement as his older brother. But when I saw what my youth pastor did for me and my family, that's when I realized what I had been missing-grace. My life was full of trophies, but they were lifeless, just like my life was filled with achievements but lacked compassion. Even more, my mom later shared with me, “David. Did you ever wonder why nobody touched you when you left the gang?” I said no. “When your brother was really deep in the gang, they all wanted him to be their leader. Because he had the charisma, the fighting skills, the smarts, everything.” So basically what my brother told the gang was, “Look, one of us has to succeed in life to take care of my parents, and we know it’s not going to be me. Because I already messed up in life. But David is going to be that guy. So leave him alone even though he didn't get jumped out, and I will make this gang big.” And he did. Everyone knew who my brother was back in the ‘90s. But he's also the reason why I was safe, because he told the guys, “Don’t touch David. Because he needs to take care of our parents.” While I judged him, he protected me. Yeah, that's when I realized I was doing everything right on the outside but had missed what was most important on the inside. And as I repented, that's also the time when I chose to work with young people so that I can make a positive impact on their lives. I knew what I wanted to do at that moment, and I went full speed. You’ve had a very tumultuous relationship with your brother and parents. What’s the main thing you’ve learned from this? Through the years, I realized just how important it is to take care of our parents, no matter how imperfect they may be. The Bible doesn’t say honor your parents if they buy you a car or if you have the nicest clothes. You know what I’m saying? It’s “honor your parents”. So as the younger generation, yeah we know how to use technology; yeah we know how to use social media and communicate much faster. And the quicker and more efficient we are, we think we know better. But the older I became, I realized it really does come down to character. Sometimes I think we value ourselves too much on our productivity and skillset. Especially as young people, we try to make ourselves marketable in every way, right? Whether we’re applying for jobs, grad school, or trying to get into a relationship. But what about those people who can’t seem to do you any good? What if they’re not as smart as you, not as skilled as you? Do they have any less worth? We may politely say "no", but think about your relationships. Who do you befriend? Who have you let go, and why? When I served in Skid Row through the LoveLA Skid Row Ministry for six years, everyday the homeless came through and sincerely thanked me. They taught me more than I was ever able to give them. They showed me how to live life with gratitude, one day at a time. You’re very passionate about the AVID program. How’d you first get involved? In the teacher credentialing program at San Diego State University, they put you in different cohorts, and mine was the Crawford High/Mann Middle School group, which is located in a rather impoverished area of San Diego. It was so impoverished that not many kids went to college from there. A year before I got there, there was even a race war because half the school literally came from West Africa, and the other half came from Southeast Asia. This was not just a school of immigrants, it was a school of refugees. And as a student-teacher, it's important to do extra work to build rapport. So I coached three sports, and did extra tutoring as one of the AVID tutors in their AVID classroom. And so that’s how I became familiar with AVID program. So when I got a job at Warren High School in Downey Unified School District, I shared with the administration a little bit about the program, and they asked me to be in charge of it. I didn’t really know what I was doing at that point but I knew it would help kids so I agreed to do so. I imagine that starting and running the program on your own was a daunting task. How’d you succeed? A lot of programs were let go during the recession, which was right after we had started the AVID program at Warren. Knowing how much we needed to keep the program going, my assistant principal at the time pulled me in and explained to me that there was an opportunity to raise funds to pay for the college tutors which was essential to the program, but that I had to do some work. There’s a company called NES that runs the CBEST, which is the test that people take to become teachers. NES rents out schools once a month and by proctoring exams we can get $90 per classroom. And the parking lot was another $300. At the time, they were using about 20 to 30 rooms at a time, which meant we could raise anywhere from $2,000 to $3,000 per month. So I got to school at 4:40 AM in the morning, and I’d leave at 8 PM at night, when the whole thing was over. And we needed about $30,000 a year to pay for all the college tutors so I knew it had to be done... So for the next three years or so I showed up at 4:40 AM in the morning once a month, sometimes twice a month, with a group of AVID kids who volunteered to help out and we’d rearrange all the seats inside the classrooms in a certain way before the test started. And when the test would end, we had to go around to all the rooms and pick up trash, make sure the desks were all back in place, clean the bathroom, vacuum the library, which all ended around 8 PM. It was really hard because I also went to visit my brother on a Sunday once a month during the same time, to state prisons which also took about anywhere between 12 to 15 hours, since driving and processing time took so long. My mom slept on the passenger side and I just drove for hours. And there were days when I did NES testing on a Saturday and went to see my brother the next day. Then back to work on Monday. |
"It was like me saying, 'Look at what I was able to achieve as an immigrant! Look at me!' But it was all pomp and self-righteousness."
You spent a lot of your younger years devoting yourself to teaching and bringing this AVID program to fruition. Do you have any regrets about missing out on “normal” young people activities?
I still remember when I was 26. It was Valentine’s Weekend, and I was vacuuming the library at 7:30 PM. And I remember thinking, “Man, I’m a single guy. I should be out there dating, and here I am vacuuming at 7:30 at night.” And I remember feeling kind of sad, you know? But I gotta tell you, one of the greatest feelings for me as a teacher now, as an AVID teacher, is when I’m driving out of the parking lot and I see some random kid wearing an AVID shirt, walking straight home. That kid believes that he's going to college because of the program. And that makes me smile. And for the past 18 years, our success rate of sending our AVID students to four-year universities has been steady at 97 percent. That’s amazing. Are you still as involved in the program? I’m no longer the program coordinator, but I am one of the senior AVID teachers who works specifically with the AVID seniors on their college apps and essays. Matter of fact, we just finished AVID summer school class, which we have every summer for six weeks. The summer school starts at 8 AM, but I meet with the AVID seniors one-on-one from 7 to 8 AM, because they don’t know what to write about. So I sit with them and ask questions based on a simple questionnaire I have them fill out prior to our conversation. And through careful probing, we’re able to get their ideas out. It’s a very rewarding experience because you’re helping students find their stories. And a bunch of them just ball up and cry because of strong emotions that are tied to their stories. To be part of that chapter of their lives is incredibly rewarding as an educator. The kind of help you offer is clearly super valuable. Have you ever thought about monetizing your services? A lot of your work you’ve been doing is you volunteering your time, free of charge. Dude, that’s a good question, because I had dinner with my college friends last December in Orange County, and they are all smart money guys. And they said, “Hey David, I got so many people down here in Buena Park who could totally use your service. You should do this for money!” I thought about it. I really thought about it. Because all those years, my thing was helping people, helping people, helping people. But when I heard how much money is involved in this industry... And I just lost my father last year and I fully take care of my mother. I know I can always use extra cash...I'm not sure...like, I don’t just do essays; I do college counseling as well. I go to UC and CSU conferences every year. I’m in touch with these big prep academies that deal with top notch kids. I've helped my kids get into Ivy League schools, UC schools. So I think I know almost as much as they know. And so I thought about doing a little private consulting thing, you know? Especially because we grew up low income. My father was a butcher, and my mom worked in supermarkets, so we grew up in a one bedroom apartment all my life. I didn’t have a couch until my senior year of high school. I remember one time we couldn’t pay rent so we got evicted. So I thought about why I wasn’t doing this for money. Especially because rich Korean-American parents are willing to pay for anything when it comes to their kids' colleges, you know? And I know I can really help them. But when I recently mentioned this idea to one of my mentors, he said, “But David, if you spend time doing that, you won’t get to help your high school kids as much, which is what you love doing.” And I think he's right. So I'm just pressing forward with what I know, which is helping underserved students get into a four-year university. I really admire how devoted you are to service. I imagine it’s hard to get others to emulate that same mentality, however. Do you ever get really frustrated by this? My good friend, Grace Yoo, was running for City Council a few years ago. On Election Day, I took the day off from work because I was driving grandmas to the voting polls all day from 7 AM to 7 PM. And I gotta tell you. The grandmas did everything they can to help us. These halmonis didn’t know ANYTHING about that vote except that there was a Korean-American running. They only knew the number [for Yoo] on the ballot, but they still came. I still remember when I went to pick up this one grandma, and she literally looked like this *bends over at 90 degrees* but she still came out. She came out for us-their children. My heart broke so much that day because you got these halmonis, who are living off of social security and welfare checks, coming out to vote simply because they believed that their vote would help the next generation of Koreans here in the States. Do you think these halmonis believed that their lives would change that much as a result of their vote? But they came out for us! But what broke my heart was I had so many friends that lived in the district who didn't vote, simply because the issues at hand, like the lack of low income and senior housing, didn't affect them personally... It's really hard to get many votes in Koreatown because our neighborhood is heavily gerrymandered. And the city council won't help our community in any way. We are the ones who need to fight for the marginalized, like our seniors who gave up everything for their children, but too many young people simply don't seem to care. We got all these expensive apartments going up that the seniors and long time residents can't afford, which also adds to the homelessness in our neighborhood, but too many people, children of these very seniors who broke their back to put food on the table for their children, don't seem to care because they think one vote won't make a difference. But that one grandma, she came out hunchbacked, because she believed her one vote was going to make a difference. Asian Americans are notoriously overlooked in politics, and as a demographic we’re not as politically involved as some other ethnic groups. Do you see this changing? You know how the comfort women are dying out in Korea -- only a few are left, right? When they die, who’s going to fight for them? When our parents came to this country, their mentality was to keep their heads down, not cause drama, and just work, work, work. But we, Korean-Americans, don’t know how to fight for ourselves, kind of like the first generation. Or maybe it's just inconvenience. I don't know. But what I do know for certain is that all the other minority populations, they fight; they know how to mobilize and fight for themselves. Korean communities have been passive for too long. We need to advocate for ourselves by mobilizing together. Otherwise, we’re doing our parents and ourselves a disservice. We can come together and fight for our community. It's not too late, but we must act, now. Because one day we, too, will be in need of help from our children, but our children can live out only what they had seen from their parents-us. So if we want to leave a legacy of honor that lasts throughout generations, then we must learn to honor our parents this very day. Thank you. |