Coming to Florida from Caguas, Puerto Rico, Miguel Angel Torres-Lopez, is a math teacher at Cape Coral High School who grew up with a very good childhood. He had many great memories with his family and friends with many great influences who led him to become who he is today.

Before coming to Florida, Torres enjoyed being outside and used his creativity to keep himself entertained. “I used to live in a mountain, and I liked to construct little paper boats and see them go down the hill with the amount of water that was at the ditch.”

Torres and his family did not have an efficient amount of money. His family could not afford to buy him the new guitar he wanted so he decided to get his first job during high school as a math tutor to build up the money to be able to afford one for himself.

As he continued to be a math tutor throughout high school, it helped him see what he wanted to do as a career, and as he got older it led him to his current profession. 

“I was used to helping others understand the material that my math teacher did for the day. I also remember my math teacher creating groups with a leader in each group. I was one of the leaders and I was happy to help others.”

Torres also had a great passion for music and wanted to do something in his life related to it. He had many great influences in Puerto Rico that helped encourage him to get into the music industry and do something he was passionate about. “My greatest influence was my music teacher, he gave me a lot of curiosity about music, to create songs or figure out how to play a song with my flute.”

Torres had many obstacles after graduating high school such as going into college with no money at all. The college he decided to go to was far from his home and prevented him from having persistent transportation to and from school. To solve this problem, he moved to a different college closer to his parents house while he continued to work and study hard.

 In 2017, Torres moved from Puerto Rico to the continental United States of America to have a fresh start and begin a new life. He decided to move to Florida because he had many family problems and felt as if he was not living life to the fullest. “That decision was taken because my son was bullied in school, my wife’s salary and my salary was not enough to live, it felt that we were surviving and not having a life, and because of the amount of crimes happening in the island.”

He was very fearful coming into the mainland because he knew little to no English and had to find a profession he wanted to commit to. He had his first interview and realized that becoming a math teacher was what he wanted to do. 

“At first, I was super scared of everything that was happening. I quit my job in Puerto Rico, I sold my house there, I also sold part of my belongings. We moved in the middle of that summer in 2017 and started a new life.”

To Torres, family means everything to him. He values communication with his wife Noelia and their two kids. He also likes to help around the house and be able to give his family the life they deserve.

 “I married Noelia on June 2, 2001. We have excellent communication; we take care of each other. Usually, I go home first, so I am the one that usually cooks. Exactly when I finish, she arrives home. We eat together, we talk daily, and we respect each other.”

He continued, “I have two kids, Yan who is a college student and Lya who is a student in Cape Coral high School.”

Torres’ daughter, Lya explained, “I think we’ve definitely gotten closer lately. Since now, he’s been driving me to school every day, so we’ve been able to talk and get closer every day like we used to when we were little.” 

Even though becoming a teacher may seem easy, there may be a lot of misconceptions that come along with it such as who they are as a person. Lya says, “A big misconception is that he’s too strict or mean, because he can actually be like a very kind and generous person.”

Torres added on saying, “the biggest misconception is that people think that being a teacher is easy, that anyone can do it, but being a teacher is not easy if you do your work correctly, all your planning, communication with parents, extra time for tutoring, all the work that you take home.”

For Torres, being a teacher may be rewarding, but also challenging. He shows that as much time as he puts into being a teacher he still needs to balance time with his family and personal life. As well, coming to the teaching career is more challenging than it seems for him because English was not his first language. 

“The most challenging aspect of my work is the balancing of the amount of work that you have versus the thing that you do, your personal life. It was harder when I became a new teacher in Cape Coral, still learning English, doing presentations for each class, learning the system.”

With being a teacher and balancing his personal life, Torres has learned many values that he now believes in and brings out his side of humor that he may not have shown as much before. 

Lya explained, “This one time, me and my family, we went to a movie theater, and before the movie played, my dad wanted to take some selfies, and so we all had to pose for a photo. But anytime he clicked the shot, it was, like, completely blurry, or like you couldn’t see anyone, it was just his face. And I think that shows how he can be very, like silly.” 

“The values most important to him are humor, kindness and patience,” said Lya. 

Torres’s values, struggles, family, career and passion for music creates him as the person he is today.

“I want to continue to play the guitar, the drums, doing karaoke, everything related to music. I have recorded two albums with a friend that lives in Connecticut. Is the first time that I sing in a recording. The project is called G-duet. Doing that project was super fun. We are in the process of recording a third album.”

 Ultimately, Torres still has goals he wants to accomplish even though he feels he has made some of the biggest ones already.