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![Every day during lunch, Hau-In Lau sits in her room, working on her laptop while snacking on fruits.
For Lau, the 25 minutes of lunch time are both a planning period and a second seminar to help her English Language Learner students. Teaching seven different courses across SM East and Indian Hills Middle School, it’s critical for Lau to be in her classroom during lunch, working while helping students.
Lau’s planning class and eating a banana when ELL 3 student and junior Hanifa Gul Mohammad walks in.
“I have crepes. It’s from France,” Gul Mohammad said.
“From what class?”
“International foods class.”
“See, that’s my lunch, you know, so I don’t worry,” Lau said. “Sometimes I get lunch from my students. So I say, ‘Go sign up for food’s class’ [laughs].”
Lau is the only Chinese and ELL teacher — having founded both programs in her 16 years at East. After two decades of providing critical opportunities to students in SMSD, she’ll retire in the spring.
“I love teaching,” Lau said. “My ELL students and Chinese students have been wonderful, but I’m only one small person. I feel my health is failing, my vision is getting worse… I just feel like maybe I don’t want to wait until I’m blind or get any health problems.”
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