Carmen Hernández remembers how happy and proud she was the day when the eldest of her two boys started school. However, that day marked the beginning of a long struggle for Hernández whose child seemed unable to make progress in class.

Year after year, the boy, Óscar Zempoalcecacl, lagged behind the rest of his class with very low grades. The mother, a Brooklyn factory worker, dreaded seeing the "F" that would often be marked on his report cards. The boy never managed to reach the level of achievement the teachers expected.

"What can I do to help?" Hernández remembers repeatedly asking Óscar's teachers. The teachers agreed with her that her child needed some help, but they didn't seem to have any specific advice – at least none that she could understand.

Finally, following one teacher's suggestion, she reached out to an organization that supports public school students in the city. There, an attorney spoke to Hernández about rights she did not know she had.

"That's when I learned I had the right to receive interpretation and translation services. Up until that moment, nobody at my son's school had told me I had a right to ask for that," Hernández states.

She was told she could ask for an interpreter when she spoke to the school staff. She eventually did ask for an interpreter to ask for her son to be transferred to a smaller school with smaller classes.

Óscar, it turned out, had been suffering from attention deficit disorder. He's now 13, and his grades have improved noticeably.

"Schools take no action unless parents demand it," said the 37-year old Hernández, born in Zacatlán, a town in the Mexican state of Puebla. She has now joined other Mexican mothers at the La Unión organization, hoping to inform other parents about the city public school system.

One school, many worlds

Limited knowledge of English, exhausting work hours, lack of immigration papers, and fear of speaking out are a few factors, amongst others, that force Mexican parents to think twice before trying to benefit from the free translation and interpretation services that are provided at the city's schools. A regulation implemented in 2006 states that the Department of Education must provide parents of Limited English Proficiency children, who make up about 53 percent of the student population, with "significant opportunities to participate and to accede to programs and services" critical in the children's education.

Nicole Colina-Duigean, a spokeswoman for the Department of Education, said that: "New York Department of Education is one of the most diverse organisms in providing translation and interpretation services in eight key languages across the city."

In spite of the regulation, many parents say their concerns are simply lost in translation.

Some parents who have used the services complain of inadequate interpretation. Besides the language barrier, the cultural disparity between Mexican and American perspectives on education has created an even larger barrier.

That has been the experience of another Mexican mother, 35-year old Elizabeth Mendoza, who got into trouble when she taught her daughter Adriana the multiplication tables.

"My daughter was told that she was cheating. Her test was taken away from her because math is not taught the same way here. It's done in vertical line while in our country it's done in horizontal line, and here in the United States that looks like cheating," says Mendoza, adding that her limited English made it twice as hard to face Adriana's fourth-grade teacher and school staff in her efforts to clear the misunderstanding.

Indeed, language is only one of many obstacles for immigrant parents in city schools, according to Adrián Franco, a Ph.D. candidate at Teachers College. Parental involvement is a challenge for many immigrants because the role of parents in the American education system is different from the role they have in schools in other parts of the world.

In the United States, parents and teachers are seen as jointly responsible for a child's education. Parents are expected to attend school meetings, help their kids with homework and assist in their children's academic development.

In other parts of the world, particularly in Latin America, teachers are considered experts and authority figures who do not need parents' cooperation, said the Mexican-born Franco.

"In other words, the division between school and home is rigid and usually neither teachers nor parents dare to cross the line that separates them," Franco said. "When immigrant parents arrive at school in the United States, they get a culture shock that is not easy to overcome without the participation of both sides – the school authorities and parents themselves."

Resourcefulness required

Some parents with limited English proficiency say that although there is a language barrier that separates them from teachers, it is up to the parents to be resourceful and look for different options for their children's education.

"You can find someone at the school who speaks Spanish – and it won't necessarily be the person who cleans the bathrooms," said Román Barroso, owner of a construction company. Barroso has often had to take time off work to go to his daughter's school. The girl, an 11th grade honors student, suffers from frequent panic attacks.

"We were helped in many ways by the teachers, the social workers," said Barroso. "Yes, there are many things to struggle with and I don't speak English well. But somehow I've managed to overcome that." He added, "We come to this country with many limitations, that's true. But it's our responsibility to break through the obstacles in the education system."

The urgent need to help their children is one of the reasons that drive many immigrants to register in English classes. The Unidad de Voluntarios de Educación para Adultos (Volunteer Unit for Adult Education, or UVEA) is one group that has experienced this need firsthand. UVEA provides English classes to Mexican immigrants so they can better adapt to life in the United States, as well as help their children in school.

"I believe many parents go back to school in order to help their children with homework," said Juan Castillo, a Mexican-born industrial engineer who founded UVEA.

While parents use the resources available or do what they can to understand what happens in school, advocacy groups promise to keep up the fight to ensure that all city schools provide suitable interpretation and translation services.

"We must ensure that the key documents arrive at the students' homes in their own language," said Deycy Avitia, of the New York Immigration Coalition.

Last year La Unión, a non-profit organization, surveyed 80 Mexican mothers in Sunset Park, Brooklyn in an effort to learn about their experiences with the education system. It found that many of them faced barriers for lack of translation and interpretation services.

"Our first recommendation for the Chancellor's office is to establish a system that allows access to these parents' languages, especially in schools with a large number of English-limited parents, so we can be sure there's compliance with the regulations," said Leticia Alanís, co-director of La Unión.

The group also wants a system to monitor the schools to make sure the services are being provided, especially in schools where the majority of parents are not English speakers. Moreover, the schools should have visible signs announcing the translation and interpretation facilities they are providing to parents.

Advocates hope that with more interpretation and translation services more immigrant parents will be encouraged to get involved in their children's education.

Things can be difficult for immigrant families even with an interpreter's help. Elizabeth Mendoza says she was not always satisfied with the quality of the interpretation provided by the schools.

"Sometimes the interpreter does not help as one would like, and sometimes there wasn't one available. In many cases my daughter was the interpreter," she says.

The use of kids as interpreters has frequently been criticized by advocates. In a 2007 report, Advocates for Children and other groups said they had found first-graders interpreting for their parents and said that on several occasions "parent coordinators pulled students out of their classes to interpret."

Mendoza's daughter, Adriana, has grown up interpreting for her mother not just in school, but also at the hospital and even in court.

"Children sometimes have to assume responsibilities that maybe are not suitable, but they do it because often there's nothing else that can be done," says Mendoza. Her daughter, 16, recently got an award for her good grades in high school. Once she graduates, Adriana wants to go to college to study to become an interpreter and translator.

This story was written as part of an education reporting fellowship granted by New York Community Media Alliance.