And I know the obvious answer would be, “Well just learn another language” but that is a big undertaking and doesn’t exactly change my current situation.

I’ve taught abroad in Europe and Asia. I’ve had students from all over, speaking all kinds of languages. And the thing with ESL is that you don’t rely on the student’s native language because you might have a classroom full of students of a variety of native languages. At my current school we have a number of Spanish speakers with little English proficiency but we also have Arabic speakers who are beginner learners. So the assumption that I must speak Spanish to do my job, and it’s ridiculous that I got this job without that skill, isn’t even all that relevant because how does that help the Arabic speaking students? Do they not matter?

Once again, I know learning Spanish could make me a better educator but it would take me years before I would be able to call myself a “Spanish speaker”. And in the meantime having people assume I’m missing what must be a necessary skill at my job wears at me.