As many students were saddened by the sudden absence of English 10 teacher Elaine Maxwell, a new smile awaits them to take control of the classroom and to help guide them through their academic studies. Ms. Ashley Garcia, placed as the new long-term substitute teacher for Maxwell, has taken these students as her own as she takes on the challenge of teaching an unfamiliar subject.

“I’m really grateful because the students here are amazing,” Garcia said. “English, I’ll admit, it’s not my favorite subject, but that’s the challenge of it, and I don’t mind it.”

Before her substitute job for Maxwell, Garcia had prior experience working in the realm of teaching. Working as a substitute teacher for a couple of years, Garcia embraces the community of the Chino Valley Unified School District, mainly at Ayala High School and Chino High School. But before she took this job, Garcia was occupied with an important and overlooked, yet meaningful job.

“I love the community here. I’ve been subbing for about two to three years now. The kids here are amazing, the staff here is amazing. I love the staff because they always make it very, very welcoming,” Garcia said. “Before being a substitute teacher, I was an aide. As an aide, I was there one-on-one with the student, or sometimes I’m there with the student for a very long period.”

When she had first received news of her role, Garcia had not been informed about the length of her stay in the classroom. Despite it only being her second long-term substitution job in her career, she’s quite familiar with being in this position. However, even after learning about the intensity of this job, she still embraced her classes with an open mindset.

“I didn’t know it was going to [be] this long,” Garcia said. “I’m trying to become a history teacher. And I like these long terms because it gives me practice as a teacher. It teaches me what each class needs and what classes don’t need.”

In the classroom, it is almost like their teacher had never left. Under Garcia’s direction, students find themselves in a comparatively more relaxed environment. Despite learning at the same pace and discipline as before, pressure was lifted from their shoulders as they were able to openly chat and work with their friends.

“They’re [basically] the same. They both teach well,” English 10 student Jackson Malone (10) said. “The environment’s more relaxed, and people can talk a little bit more and feel freer.”

Though the learning instruction is the same, everyone is a fan of Garcia’s ways of helping them succeed. Students are thankful for the generous assistance with confusing or complex material, as they all dive into the class’s current book, “Night,” by Elie Wiesel.

“She really helps me a lot,” one of Maxwell’s students, Sebastian Ornelas (10), said. “She helps me find certain things in the book that I’m having trouble with, and I’m just really grateful that she helps me.”

Despite picking an open random opportunity, it would soon blossom into a great journey as the students acknowledge the amount of passion she gives towards teaching the classroom, especially about a subject she is unfamiliar with. They have agreed it was the right choice to assign her to Maxwell’s class.

“I think it was a really good decision because she’s a really good teacher and she really helps you learn. She doesn’t do it just because she has to be there; she really wants to teach you. And that’s what I like about her. She helps you connect to the topic, and I just think that really helped me a lot,” Ornelas said.

As Garcia’s term comes to an end, many of her students are saddened by her leave. With the sudden turn of events, Garcia will be missed dearly by Maxwell’s students, but her smile will always be remembered around campus.