The Missionary

Without a plan after high school, Beightol figured he'd join the navy. A chance encounter with a dean at the former Miami Christian College changed everything. Armed with a full academic scholarship, Beightol set out for Miami, his first visit to a big city. "I jumped in a Camaro with $100 and a suitcase."

He didn't exactly make an ideal seminarian. Intellectually querulous, Beightol refused to sign a document swearing off various temptations, including drinking. He cited Proverb 31 in his defense: "Give beer to those who are perishing, wine to those who are in anguish." He was seen as a rebel and placed under special supervision. At his ordination, he wore a wrinkled suit and boat shoes without socks.

During his time at Miami Christian, Beightol attended weekend Bible studies at Central Alliance Church on 106th Street. He became a missionary in Liberty City, working with kids making the transition from juvenile detention back to inner city life. Beightol's intense earnestness could be overwhelming, said Jack Edwards, a former elder at Central Alliance. "He would sometimes take over in [Bible] class and I would have to slow him down," Edwards remembered. But his energy meshed with the troubled teenagers. "He just sort of had a gift where he could speak to kids and bring something out of them," Edwards said. "He was always one for the underdog."

Idealistic and faithful to a fault, Beightol once made a house call in a notoriously dangerous housing project in the midst of a small riot. A group of teens jumped him, beating him from behind until several women came to his defense. "I thought God would protect me," Beightol recalled.

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In a windowless classroom on the second floor of Miami Edison, second-year algebra teacher Hector Lopez was walking from desk to desk during a recent class, critiquing work and giving awkward high-fives. "My God, these kids are ready to work," he practically shouted. Speaking in hushed snippets of Kreyol, the 25 sophomores, juniors, and seniors consulted or, in some cases, copied each other's equations from FCAT workbooks.

Lopez, a 54-year-old former software designer with a persistent cowlick and a frenetic classroom manner, left a six-figure job with IBM to teach in the inner city. After 23 years in the corporate world, he wanted to try teaching, do something more meaningful. "This is the front lines," he said.

He tries to keep things interesting with Internet-based lessons, but he has to share the department's one LCD projector with eleven other teachers. Inspiring his kids is an uphill battle. Just helping them understand the written directions is a challenge.

Miami-Dade, the fourth-largest district in the nation, educates more than a third of a million students from 168 different countries at more than 300 schools. One in three students lives in a home where English is a secondary language, if it's spoken at all. Nearly two-thirds of students qualify for reduced-price or free lunch. More than 30,000 have disabilities ranging from hearing impairment to profound retardation. About 40 percent don't make it to graduation day with their classmates.

Many teachers don't make it, either. One of Lopez's colleagues at Edison, a veteran math teacher, recently left midyear to take a job with Boeing at almost twice the pay. Lopez doesn't blame his colleague. "To be honest with you, I don't know what I'm going to do in two years. Money is the bottom line."

Shelves lined with multiple answer booklets instead of novels are testament to Edison's obsession with ending five years of failing FCAT scores. There are constant classroom visits by administrators and bi-weekly FCAT reviews handed down from the main office. "I'm spending my time giving bi-weeklies and FCAT bullshit," Lopez said of the previous school year. "A lot of times, the bi-weeklies had nothing to do with what I taught that week." Lopez was fortunate. His principal allowed him to give his own tests this year. "I'm lucky they listened."

At lunchtime in the teachers' lounge, some of Lopez's colleagues were less grateful. The pressure is intense, said English teacher Judy Brown, a 34-year veteran of Miami-Dade schools. Teachers leave, or are forced to leave, constantly. "It's a revolving door, baby. It's all about the scores. If your scores aren't good, you got to go."

Myriam Ariza, a nationally certified art teacher from Chicago, said she was ready to get out after a year. "In the big picture, I'm just concerned about real teaching and real learning. Basically real teaching has been limited to babysitting."

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"Are we committing the resources to win this war, or are we fucking around?"

Beightol was sitting outside Zeke's on Lincoln Road after school one day this past November, sipping a three-dollar Miller Lite and talking a mile a minute about the contract, occasionally rummaging around in his tote bag for documents to prove this or that point. "Milk has gone up, eggs have gone up, insurance has gone up," he said. "Our people are living on credit cards."