As a 14-year-old immigrant from Cuba to the United States by herself in September 1996, Reinaleidy Cairos had to learn how to adapt fast if she wanted to succeed in her new home. She was not the first of her family to immigrate to the United States, but she was the first to get a formal education in the U.S. Being an immigrant raised many challenges for Cairos; she was facing a lot of back lash from a lot of people because she is an immigrant.
“There were a lot of cliques in high school, and I didn’t understand what the other kids were saying, but I knew they were making fun of us,” Cairos said.
Cairos was not fluent in English until she was in college. In high school all her classes were ESOL classes; the teachers and the students would only speak Spanish. It helped her feel understood and she adjusted to the new culture.
“When I immigrated to the United States, I didn’t understand the culture,” Cairos said, “in Cuba people kiss each other’s cheeks to say hello, but in America you just say hi.”
Her family didn’t know that she was struggling so much in school because she never complained to them. Cairos could not ask them for help because her family also did not know English and they were not planning to learn the language. They did not think she was struggling because she got honor roll when she graduated high school and she had so many friends.
“When I got to the United States, I did not see Reina struggling, but at the same time I didn’t care because I missed my home and was in a sour mood,” Inalbys Holkon, Cairo’s sister, said, ” I just didn’t feel like helping anybody, I thought she was adjusting fine and it made me envious.”
She was doing many firsts, and it paved the way for the rest of her younger family. She earned her high school diploma and later with a lot of hard work she received her bachelor's degree in education.
“High school wasn’t hard because I spoke the same language that I grew up in, but in college everything was harder, I was not prepared,” Cairos said.
Cairos said that she did not really learn how to speak English until her cousin Lourdes moved from Texas to Miami. She spoke Spanish to Lourdes and Lourdes would speak English. She was feeling a lot of pressure from her mother to go to college because her mother is a nurse, and her father is a doctor. Cairos went to college to make her parents happy, but she had no clue what she wanted to do and was struggling a lot. Cairos said she felt like she was drowning in college, so she dropped out after one semester and joined the work force. Her family did not know she was struggling until later in life, they thought she dropped out because of monetary problems.
“Reina started working at a daycare because college was so expensive and we didn’t have the money for it,” said Esmeralda Laurenti, Cairo’s mother.
She started working at a daycare center with her older sister as an aftercare teacher helping kids with their homework. Later, she got promoted as a vpk teacher, keeping it promoted until she became director of the daycare center. Cairos said she would have stayed at the daycare if the owner had not sold it to someone else.
“I met the new owner of the daycare back when Reina worked there, I hated her because she told me once that Reina was part of the package deal when she bought the place,” Laurenti said, “she was talking about my daughter as if she was some kind of slave!”
The new owner did not make it easy for Cairos to do her job. They gave her jobs that required four people and Cairos could not do it. Cairos was forced to quit after a meeting with the new owner about her job performance. The owner was berating her in front of the whole staff instead of doing it in private. Cairos was very embarrassed, so she quit on the spot.
“The owner was abusing me, I was very upset, so when I quit, I realized I had to go back to school so I can see what else is out there,” Cairos said.
She started Miami Dade College with no idea what she wanted to do so she just did the general courses. Cairos was a part-time student because she was working at the Palmetto Hospital as a receptionist to pay for college. Holkon said it is because both her mother and sister were too afraid of student loans, so they only paid $600 worth of classes each semester. Cairos finished her associates degree and was going to Florida International University to get her degree in physical therapy. She changed her mind when she went to her niece’s elementary school’s open house and started volunteering at the school.
“I kind of always knew Reina was going to be a teacher,” Holkon said. “Ever since she started working at the daycare and started volunteering at my kid’s elementary school, she has a way with kids that shows that she was born to be a teacher.”
Cairos spent 10 years to finish her college education to become a kindergarten teacher. When she started applying to schools, she got a job offer at Lake Stevens Elementary as a Pre-K SPED teacher. Cairos wanted to be a kindergarten teacher, but she accepted the offer to become a SPED teacher in fear of not being offered another job. She ended up loving being a SPED teacher, working on improving kids' social skills, social-emotional skills, pre-academic studies, and pre-writing.
“They sold me the position as if it were the best setting ever, all unicorns and rainbows, I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, but it worked out and I ended up loving it,” Cairos said.
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