Page 381 - Between One and Many The Art and Science of Public Speaking

348 Part 4 Contexts for Public Speaking

Jaime Escalante, whose picture you see in the opening photograph, is not simply
a gifted teacher. He is a remarkable person. He immigrated to the United States
from Bolivia in 1969, where he had taught mathematics and physics. He spoke
not a single word of English. But Escalante had what he called ganas—that is, a
ganas desire to succeed regardless of the odds against it. Thus at age 30 he reentered
Spanish term that loosely school to work toward his teaching credential, even though it meant subjecting
translates as the desire to
his out-of-shape body to a required course in P.E.
succeed.
Escalante’s life became the subject of the critically acclaimed fi lm Stand and
Deliver. In the movie, actor Edward James Olmos portrays Escalante, who took
East Los Angeles barrio students who could barely do simple math and, in two
years of intensive work, prepared them for the Advanced Placement Test in Cal-
culus. His students were so successful that all 18 who attempted the test in 1982
passed, the most from any high school in Southern California. Each year more
students passed; by 1987, 87 of his students passed the exam. Remember, these
were students who were not expected to attend college, let alone receive college
credit for calculus while still in high school. But as Escalante says, “Students will
rise to the level of expectations.” When students wanted to quit, Escalante would
challenge them by saying, “Do you have the ganas? Do you have the desire?” 2
Although there are many reasons Escalante was able to overcome odds others
would have perceived as insurmountable, we think his success in life as well as
in the classroom can be found in that word of his: ganas. Not only did Escalante
have it when he needed it, but also his life is testimony to the fact that he has in-
stilled it in many of his students. As a result, they too have succeeded.
In a sense, this chapter is about ganas. Like Jaime Escalante, the best infor-
mative speakers do more than simply pass on information to an audience. With
their words and actions, they create a desire in their audience to put the infor-
mation to constructive use. In the case of Escalante, the desire involved a subject
that many students prefer to avoid: mathematics. In yours, it may involve any-
thing from how we treat our environment to the kind of foods we eat.

Ryan Neil is an Ameri-
can who speaks
fl uent Japanese. He
is an apprentice and
translator for famous
Bonsai artist Masahiko
Kimura. As Kimura
demonstrates his tech-
niques Ryan must ac-
curately translate what
he says into English to
make the presentation
accessible to non-
Japanese speaking
audiences.