Fran’s Many Miracles
Madeline Northup
When Fran Marafino was just fourteen years old, she sat straight-backed in her guidance counselor’s office facing an impossible command. Looking over her IQ test, which had been solely based on popular cultural phenomena that only American-born kids would understand, she declared that Fran could not take a foreign language. Her knowledge of Pippi Longstocking was so limited, that it impaired her ability to learn another language. Or so the confused counselor thought.
Fran had been born in 1946 in Grotte, in the province of Agrigento, Sicily. Growing up in Sicily, she had almost immediately become bilingual, speaking first Sicilian, and then learning Standard Italian. When she came to the United States at the age of ten, she had quickly learned English, making her trilingual. So, when the guidance counselor told her she could not, in fact, learn another language, as she was supposedly incapable, she was not only confused, but challenged. She would prove to her that she could learn a fourth language easily. And so she did.
French came easily to Fran. Then Spanish, then teaching English as a second language. No knowledge of Winnie the Pooh needed. Only a drive to learn more about the world, and to connect people across linguistic divides.
Her own mother encouraged her to pursue her dreams, something which she herself was not easily able to do. Working as a day laborer picking produce that was in season at the time, her mother supported her four children as a young widow. While life was not easy, her mother worked hard to support her children, two of which eventually married while they were still living in Sicily. That left Fran and her older brother to care for.
Knowing that his sister’s life would be easier in America, Fran’s uncle arranged for the three of them to move to the United States. When they arrived, they settled in Jamestown, NY, where a spacious apartment outfitted with a television and a refrigerator greeted them. Fran and her brother had never been so surprised and overjoyed in their lives.
While her brother and mother worked to help support the family, Fran attended school. Her mother never encouraged her to follow in her footsteps as a day laborer, or in her new job as a factory worker. In fact, she warned against it. She wanted Fran to have an education that would propel her to greater means, and greater intellectual growth. And Fran wanted that too.
The road to higher education for Fran was not as challenging academically as it was personally. With tests being used at the time that determined a person’s intellect based off of foreign social factors, Fran had to frequently advocate for herself, eventually getting into the classes she wanted despite pushback from unknowing counselors and advisors. Inside the classroom, however, she flourished. Completing advanced classes in high school with flying colors, Fran yearned to go to college. Her teachers also encouraged her to apply, signing her up for college fairs and visits whenever they could. But there was only problem: money.
Attending university, then and now, was expensive. Knowing her mother was not able to financially support the entirety of her education, she had almost given up on both of their dreams for further learning when her great uncle, childless and a great supporter of education, came to her. In one moment, he changed her life when he offered her the money that she would need to attend four years of college. God had given Fran a miracle, and she took it.
Attending first a community college in Jamestown, New York, then Clarion University in Pennsylvania (now PennWest), Fran became even more interested in languages, majoring in French and minoring in English. Yearning for a spiritual connection that the university could not provide, Fran and a friend even started a religious group. This group, centered on helping students bond spiritually through fun events and activities, was the first the university ever had.
Completing her Bachelor’s degree, Fran went on to pursue a Master’s degree in French. As she continued her studies, she started to teach French to students in grades 5 through 12 in a central city school in New York. She quickly realized, though, that schools across the country, including the school that she taught at, were cutting down on language departments in an effort to save money. This was nothing new to Fran, as she has seen language departments rise and fall with every instance of economic strain. But, in her experience, they always come back.
Knowing that the current cycle of language loss would end, but not knowing when, Fran decided to switch her Master’s degree to Bilingual Education. This path opened many doors for her, including certification in ESL, French, Spanish, and English. With this change, God had performed yet another miracle for Fran. She would never again be out of a job, for languages would guide her to multiple schools in many different places.
After completing her Master’s degree, which she had completed while working as an administrative assistant for a police station in New York, another job that she had to advocate for, she went on to teach at a Christian school, where she met her husband, Joseph Marafino, who taught mathematics throughout his life. They soon married, moving to Rochester, NY, then Arizona, where they spent many years teaching and raising their daughter.
I met Fran in 7th grade, around the same age she was when she was almost denied the right to learn a language. Her grandchildren attended the same Montessori school as me, where she got a job as a Spanish teacher on pure coincidence. I’d like to think of it, though, as another miracle that God gave Fran, and even me.
Fran inspired my love of languages. She made language learning accessible, never denying a child the right to learn anything they were interested in. Although I did not continue to study Spanish, I credit her with showing me that language learning can be fun, no matter what the language is.
I’m so glad she didn’t listen to that guidance counselor those many years ago. My life, and the lives of many other students that she taught, would not have been the same if she did.