Copyright The Philadelphia Inquirer
David Lon, principal of Mastbaum High in Kensington, calls the Morales family a bedrock of the school. He’s not exaggerating. Aisha Morales, valedictorian of the Class of 2021, is now a first-year algebra teacher there. Angel Morales, top five of the Class of 2023, is an apprentice in the sheet-metal workers union, and an assistant baseball coach at the school. Angelysse Morales is a 10th grader, a star student in the career and technical education high school’s nursing track, but also taking classes in its brand-new police science program. Anastasia Morales, an eighth grader at nearby Julia deBurgos Elementary, is awaiting results of the high school selection process to figure out where she is enrolling next year. Students can list up to five choices, and Anastasia put Mastbaum in every single position. What’s the lure of the school? “Mastbaum,” Aisha Morales said, “is home.” The Morales family grew up a few minutes’ walk from Mastbaum: four kids with a home-health aide mom and a sheet-metal worker dad. Emily Ramirez, the children’s mother, and other family members attended Mastbaum. Her husband, Angel Morales Sr., didn’t graduate from high school. “I didn’t have what they had, a father in life. I didn’t have role models to push me forward,” Angel Sr. said. Emily was 19 when Aisha was born — a young mother, but a loving one. Both she and Angel Sr. pushed their children, encouraged them to take school seriously. And even when she was in elementary school, Aisha distinguished herself, said Hillary Linardopoulos, her third-grade teacher. “I knew from the minute I met Aisha that she was a special soul with a thoughtful and caring way about her,” said Linardopoulos, who is now policy director at the Education Law Center of Pennsylvania. “She has a deep sense of self, a deep commitment to advancing her own knowledge, a deep commitment to her family, to her friends, and to doing good in the world. And that was evident when she was 8.” When it came time for Aisha to choose a high school, Mastbaum seemed like a good fit — she thought she might want to go into nursing, and the school’s health track appealed to her. She took her classes seriously and threw herself into activities. “Instead of feeling like it was just a school, and these were your teachers, it felt like a family,” Aisha, now 22, said of Mastbaum. Two years later, it was time for Angel to pick a high school. He didn’t lock himself into Mastbaum; Angel toured a few district schools. “But I knew I wanted to work with my hands,” he said, and Mastbaum’s career focus felt right. How did his sister attending the school factor into his decision? “I knew she and all her friends were going to be there, and they were going to mess with me, but it was fine,” Angel said. (All of the siblings are close.) Aisha is outgoing, but Angel is quieter. He found his place, though, as a strong carpentry student and baseball player. And when Angel graduated in 2023, he just “kept showing up to help at practice,” Lon said. “So eventually we got him his paperwork, and now he’s an assistant coach.” Angelysse thought she would keep up the streak, and is keeping up the Morales name as an excellent student. She wasn’t expecting her sister to show up as a teacher at her school, and can’t bring herself to call her Ms. Morales in the hallway, but it has worked out anyway. “I love it,” Angelysse said. “Whenever I don’t want to go to lunch and I have work to do, I go to her class and do the work there.” Choosing a high school wasn’t tough for Anastasia. “I want to come to Mastbaum. I think it has a lot of opportunities for you, and I see how their paths went,” Anastasia said of her older sisters and brother. Families like theirs are part of what makes Mastbaum a strong school, despite the challenge of existing as a school at the epicenter of the city’s opioid crisis. “When we think of what we want to be as a school — college and career readiness, safe and welcoming — the Morales family is at the center of all that,” Lon said. As for Emily and Angel Sr., they’re over the moon. “We’re super proud of our kids,” she said. Aisha didn’t imagine she would end up back at Mastbaum. She attended Jefferson University for college, studying nursing at first, then deciding the field was not for her and switching to psychology. Aisha was the first student Lon, who became principal in 2019, really got to know well at Mastbaum. Even after graduation, she would visit the school, and from time to time, Lon would check in on her. “Then three weeks before graduation, he said, ‘You’re coming to Mastbaum when you graduate,’” Aisha said. She wasn’t an education major, Aisha said. Lon told her they’d figure it out. The idea intrigued Aisha, who began teaching students in summer programs when she was 14 and always had a rapport with children. Though Aisha had never taken an education class, Philadelphia and many other districts are increasingly turning to emergency-certified teachers to fill vacancies amid a national teacher shortage. And Lon believed in the promise of a young woman who had always had more maturity than her age would suggest. Aisha and Lon both say her first year is going well. “I already have the feel of classroom management,” Aisha said. “The kids, they don’t like math to begin with, but just getting them to understand the curriculum is sometimes hard.” Her students have figured out that her sister attends the school, and tease Aisha that she looks young, but she has built strong relationships with her students. Some of them say she’s like an adopted mom. (That tracks, Linardopoulos says: As a third grader, Aisha was a welcoming classmate to everyone, paying particular attention to make sure students who were learning English felt included.) And Aisha’s got backup. “Lon, he’s very helpful if I am struggling with anything,” Aisha said. “He’s always checking in on me: ‘Morales, do you need me, is everything OK?’” Lon prides himself on supporting teachers, but there’s something special about this one. He figures he’s got about 10 years until he retires. “Then, Aisha can be principal,” he said.
