Please Don't Go Back Where You Came From

All men are brothers. All women are sisters. We are members of one human family. This is the American dream which must be renewed with each passing generation. Nina, an Asian girl, enrolls in an American high school. She is still learning English and needs help with her classwork. Jocko, who is anything but a jock, is attracted to her and offers to tutor. Jennifer, an Irish-American girl who had considered Jocko her boyfriend, is jealous of Jocko's attention to Nina. In a rage, she loses control and says to Nina, "Why don't you go back where you came from?" Nina is crushed. Later Jennifer finds a diary written by her great-grandmother, telling of her first day in America, at a time when a sign reading N.I.N.A. in a store window meant "No Irish Need Apply." When a bigot taunted Jennifer's great-grandmother, she wanted to give up on America, until a kind landlady said to her, "Please don't go back where you came from." Jennifer, touched deeply by the diary, repeats these words to Nina and finds a new friend.