Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

The buzz about Victor started a day before he enrolled at Adamson High School.

He's "brilliant," came word from the Dallas school district's immigrant intake center. He's a computer whiz. He's one of the best prepared students from more than 12,000 the center has processed since opening in 2003.

When he arrived at Adamson a few weeks after the start of the second semester, Victor didn't disappoint.

Marcia Niemann, the lead teacher in Adamson's English as a second language program, said he is the most academically impressive ESL student she has encountered in her four years at the school. He writes English better than some U.S.-born students.

Victor comes from Monterrey, Mexico's third largest metroplex and biggest industrial center. "In Monterrey, if you don't speak English, you are no one," says the 18-year-old, a self-described nerd.

Back home, his parents each attended two years of college. They sent their son, with scholarship assistance, to an $8,000-a-year private high school. Victor plans to attend college.

That's a much different background, and educational expectation, than many of Adamson's recent immigrants, who came largely from small, rural Mexican schools. Ms. Niemann says most parents of her students have completed less than ninth grade, many much less. When they get to the U.S., some students must work to help support their families here and back in Mexico.

After complications from a broken leg in soccer caused him to miss the fall semester in Monterrey, Victor decided to live with an aunt in Dallas and improve his English.

"To succeed in life, you need tools," he says. "And English is one of the tools."

The excitement of Victor's arrival gave Ms. Niemann a lift the first few weeks after winter break, a time when she usually worries about students remaining in Mexico after visiting relatives, or getting jobs and quitting school.

The worries were warranted. One of her students had problems recrossing the border. He eventually returned to class in late January, reporting that he walked three days to get back in the United States.

Another student Ms. Niemann had been keeping a close eye on stopped coming to class. Misael, a second-year immigrant, was struggling academically. He was just two months from turning 18, the age a student can quit school without parental approval. Like several of Ms. Niemann's students, he came from the central Mexican municipality of Ocampo.

Misael ran on Adamson's cross country and track teams. So when Ms. Niemann heard that he had left school to work, she and his coach, Roberto Urbina, talked about how to bring him back. If Misael hadn't been a team member, it's unlikely anyone would have looked for him.

"They get a taste of money, and then they want to leave school," Mr. Urbina says.

A 1989 Adamson graduate, Mr. Urbina came to the United States from Mexico when he was 2. He is one of the Latino men on the Adamson faculty whom Ms. Niemann depends on when she tries to get her immigrant students connected to school. Only 16 of Adamson's 85 teachers are bilingual, including Mr. Urbina and the three Junior ROTC instructors, principal Rawly Sanchez says. As a result, many ESL students end up in green JROTC uniforms or running cross country. Ms. Niemann, an unofficial assistant coach, attends the meets.

Mr. Urbina tracked down Misael and arranged an evening meeting with team members at a restaurant near school. It's a frequent hangout where the runners often eat after practice and sometimes flirt with the waitresses.

When Misael arrives, he looks tired. Always gangly, he has lost weight since December. At his full-time job, he cleans carpets.

"I know you want money, campeón," Mr. Urbina says in Spanish. He calls all his runners campeones, champions.

"It's not that I want more money; it's that I want to help my jefa," says Misael, referring to his mother, who manages the kitchen at a nearby Mexican restaurant.

"If you get an education, you can help her even more," the coach says.

Mr. Urbina says Misael has the most raw talent of any runner he has coached in his 14 years at Adamson. Misael placed second at his first cross country meet and wore his medal all the way home afterward. Later, he barely missed qualifying for the state meet.

From his own experience, Mr. Urbina knows the value of connections to school. Had it not been for running, he doubts he would have gone to college, East Texas State (now Texas A&M-Commerce). He tells his runners that if they stay in school and run for him, they can get to college, too.

"You can win," the coach says to Misael, referring to the state meet.

"It's too late now," replies Misael, as if he has made up his mind to quit.

Abraham, the top runner on this year's team, watches the interchange. Also a Mexican immigrant, Abraham is a senior set to graduate in the top 5 percent of his class. He considers Misael a younger brother, even though Abraham is six months younger.

"What I did is nothing compared to what you can do," Abraham says.

"Yes, but you've got a mother and a father," Misael says.

"Then use that," Mr. Urbina emphasizes. "Think about your mother when you're running."

A few days later, Misael returns to class.

"I tell him to keep running, to keep doing good in school, and one day he'll be somebody really, really important," Abraham says.

Ms. Niemann tries to keep students in school as long as possible, even if they don't have much chance of graduating. She says Abraham and Misael offer real-world lessons about why some immigrants succeed in American schools and some struggle.

The age at which a student immigrates is important, as are family income, the quality of education back home and the educational backgrounds of parents.

Abraham came to Dallas at age 12 from the Mexican state of Durango. His father is a high school graduate. His mother isn't, but she has always stressed the importance of education. An older brother attends college in Mexico. Both parents work.

Moving to the U.S. at a young age, Abraham believes, made learning the language easier.

By his junior year at Adamson, he was taking Advanced Placement English. He passed his state TAKS tests, required for graduation, on the first try and is considering attending either Texas A&M-Commerce or Bacone College in Muskogee, Okla., where he hopes to continue running.

Technically, he was classified as an English language learner this past year. Ms. Niemann says he should have been moved out of the program two years ago but wasn't because of an oversight.

"He will not only graduate, but he will graduate at the highest level available in the public school system," Mr. Sanchez says.

Misael, on the other hand, moved to Dallas with his mother in 2006. Initially he came only to work, but after several weeks he enrolled at Adamson at age 16. Teen immigrants are among the most likely to struggle academically.

Misael's father, who finished elementary school, did not move to Dallas. He has been in and out of his son's life since he was young. Misael's mother, Juanita, finished third grade.

Very thin, like her son, Juanita says she works about 60 hours a week, earning $8 an hour, to help support her three kids in Dallas and one child still in Mexico.

"Between both of us, we will pull your brothers and sisters through," Juanita recalls telling Misael when they planned their move to the U.S.

In Mexico, Misael missed two years of elementary school. One of his junior high teachers remembers that he had a hard time staying focused, a trait Ms. Niemann also noticed.

At 13, while still in school, he began helping a relative plant and harvest beans and corn for $60 a week. When he was 14, tragedy struck. His younger sister died after falling off the back of a moving pickup. The accident changed Misael, his mother said.

Early on in Dallas, he had trouble controlling his temper at home and at school, his mother and Ms. Niemann recall. "He was just so overwhelmed," Ms. Niemann says. She couldn't tell if it was because of behavioral or academic problems, or both. The language barrier complicated understanding.

But when he joined Mr. Urbina's team, things changed.

"Urbina calmed me," Misael says now.

That's why Ms. Niemann was so intent on getting him back in class. She had seen what she calls "incredible improvement" in his behavior and wanted to buy as much time as possible to organize academic support for him.

Keeping Misael in school also says something about Mr. Urbina. He failed one of his Texas educator certification tests many times but didn't quit. Once he buckled down, he says, he passed.

"I know teachers that can ace that test, but they can't reach a kid," he says.

Much of second semester at any Texas high school is spent worrying about the TAKS tests and taking practice exams.

In mid-February, Ms. Niemann handed out granola bars and bottles of water during a practice language arts TAKS test. Students get snacks and drinks on actual TAKS test days. She wanted to make practice as close to real as possible. She bought the snacks herself.

One desk is noticeably vacant. Juan, also from Ocampo, was suspended the day before, after Mr. Sanchez caught him and two others fighting in a restroom. Eventually, he will go to alternative school, causing him to miss even more of Ms. Niemann's classes.

She doesn't worry about the missed test. But she does worry that Juan will get frustrated and quit school. He has spent much of his time in the U.S. working alongside adults. By the time he was 14, he had saved enough money to buy a small house near Ocampo. "He's used to being treated as an adult," Ms. Niemann says.

For the students taking the practice exam, she writes instructions on the board: They can use English-Spanish dictionaries; the teacher can read a word or phrase as well as the question and the answer choices.

"Take your time," Ms. Niemann says. "Use your dictionary."

The students are restless. One girl who has been in the U.S. less than a year points a pencil, like a dagger, at her heart.

"I'm dying here," she says in Spanish.

Some students trip over the word chunky, as in, "Females prefer chunky peanut butter over smooth."

Ms. Niemann notices the confusion. "In the United States," she says slowly, "there are two types of peanut butter. One kind is smooth. The other kind is ..."

"Chunky," one boy volunteers.

Such pauses to explain common English are part of her technique to help recent immigrants make sense of all things American.

New immigrants are eligible for some testing exemptions their first three years in the U.S. To graduate, though, they must pass all exit exams – language arts, math, science, social studies – in English, without the help of a dictionary.

The students complain about the difficulty of the practice test.

"Yes, it's hard," Ms. Niemann tells the class. "But this is what you have to do to graduate. Practice. Practice. Practice. You have a lot of time to practice."

Partly because his absences at the beginning of the semester put him behind, and partly because he struggles with even the simplest assignments, Misael failed some classes the first six-week grading period, including Ms. Niemann's. That made him ineligible to compete during most of the track season.

His teammate Abraham started going with him to tutoring. The day before the 800-meter district championship race in April, Misael became eligible again.

Mr. Urbina worried about his preparation. The 800 meters is an excruciating race. Misael had been training by himself and not with the team. Would he be ready?

As Ms. Niemann, coach Urbina, Abraham and other teammates watched, Misael led the field after the first lap of the two-lap race. "Woo hoo," Mr. Urbina yelled. "That guy is a warrior."

Misael didn't win, but he finished a close second. And, more important, he was still in school.

That wasn't to be for Victor, the gifted student from Monterrey who caused a buzz at the beginning of the semester.

Three weeks before the end of school, he suddenly returned home. He wanted to be with his mother, who was recovering from surgery.

By the time Victor left, he had doubts that Adamson was the right school for him. Math was easier and there was much less homework than back home. He, like many immigrants, was surprised at how Mexican Adamson seemed and how much Spanish was spoken. He worried that he wouldn't have enough opportunity to practice English.

Next year, Victor plans to return to his private school in Monterrey. Then, he says, he may come to the United States to study sound engineering in college.

For now, he has some advice for his former classmates at Adamson:

"I would tell them to give it their best, to try and take advantage of all the opportunities the school gives them. And something really important: Strive to become even more."

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