A staunch believer in the old adage “education is the key to one’s success,” Dr. Lynette Ali, an educator by profession and passion, wants to positively impact her community, South Ozone Park, New York, specifically Guyanese immigrants – both parents and children.
Dr. Lynette Ali
Ali, a Guyanese who early determined to achieve the highest level of academic excellence, recently earned her doctoral degree at St. John’s University.
She intends to very soon start a journey to appease Guyanese-American families through her writings – a two-fold method that includes writing articles on issues that affect the immigrant family. “Being a school teacher and an English major, I would like to write children’s story books based on the experience of the immigrant child, based on culture, so children could know that what they experience is very common…they will be more familiar with their environment. So, through literature, I want to put children at ease with who they are in their new society.”
Ali feels education should be emphasized, and she stressed the need for parents to make education a priority in their children’s lives. She said: “I believe that education could be achieved without spending a lot of money…you don’t have to be rich to achieve an education, all you need to do is have a desire and set those expectations for your children.”
Ali applauded Guyanese-American parents who “set expectations for their children,” which inevitably propel children to achieve certain goals. Those are her findings based on a study she conducted as part of her doctoral thesis, titled, ‘What family practices work best for immigrant families from Guyana.’
Ali spoke with a few families in Richmond Hill, New York; and based on her research, which took the format of a questionnaire, she concluded that: “Guyanese-American families also work very hard with their children, they give their children whatever help they need…and they also monitor their children a lot.” However, the educator feels more emphasis needs to be placed on at-home studying, since, she said: “I think that studying is important for mastery of information, because just studying for a test facilitates only short-term performance objectives.”
Ali says that through mandirs, schools and the community, she is available to assist in guiding the future generation.
