David Kitani - English
david.kitani@animo.org

I was born in LA to Japanese parents.  I grew up and went to school in Covina and West Covina.  I loved working with young people and received positive feedback when I communicated ideas so I began thinking about becoming a teacher. I got into UCLA (barely) and my experience there taught me that public education, at least in the United States, was not fair nor equal.  I realized that many of the students there had access to and received far more resources than I even knew about growing up...and I sincerely wanted a good education too.  Then I thought more about all the students at my high school that didn't even go to college and how their opportunities were even more limited.   If I was going to teach I decided I would want to teach somewhere  that needed teachers.  This was the beginning of my commitment to under served communities, namely the urban public school.  Through the UCLA Teacher Education Program and destiny, I landed at Locke High School in the fall of 2003 where I began working as an English teacher.  Little did I know that five years later Locke would make history by undergoing a major transformation, the first of its kind, to become the Animo Locke Complex through the Greet Dot School Organization.  I feel privileged to be a part of these empowering changes, now through Animo Locke II, and hope that every child will be better equipped to reach their full potential.