After spending two years covering education for the Philadelphia Inquirer, Christina Asquith knew there was something she was missing. "I wanted to know: Why are three out of four students failing math and reading tests?" she says. All of her days spent reporting in troubled Philly schools were chaperoned by a school district flack, and that wasn't going to cut it. So she quit her Inky gig, walked into Julia de Burgos Middle Magnet School and asked for a job. Weeks later, Asquith found herself in front of a classroom as an emergency-certified teacher.

Her book, The Emergency Teacher (West Parley Press), tells of the year she spent teaching sixth grade, but it's also the story of a school district plagued by an appalling lack of resources, ill-prepared and beaten-down teachers, bureaucracy, politics and, worst of all, apathy. Woven throughout, though, are moving passages about the connections she made with students. Like Ronny, whom Asquith found working at his family's convenience store the year he should have graduated from eighth grade — just like his father had threatened if he didn't pass. "[These kids] had their chance at education stolen from them and were blamed for it," says Asquith. "Ronny never learned how to read. He made a logical decision to leave and go to work. He clearly felt shame over this. But he was placed in classroom after classroom with emergency-certified teachers. Really, he was never given an opportunity." Asquith paints a portrait of families desperate to survive and students desperate to learn, and places her school's plight in the context of cultural and historical issues that contributed to the demise of a neighborhood.

This hiatus from her journalism career didn't last long. In June 2003, Asquith was sent to Iraq by the New York Times to cover U.S. rebuilding efforts and education issues. She became close friends with other journalists as well as an Iraqi woman named Zena, for whom she managed to wrangle a visa when it was apparent her life was in grave danger. Zena's story, and Asquith's experiences in Iraq, are the basis for a Lifetime miniseries currently in development. Throughout, however, Asquith's passion for education stuck with her. "The schools in Iraq are very poor, with 50 kids to a classroom and only the most basic supplies," says Asquith, who now lives in D.C. and is at work on a book about the Iraqi women's rights movement. "But because they have great classroom management and no discipline problems, I found that the teachers actually got a lot of content across in the average morning."

Christina Asquith reads Tue., March 14, 7 p.m., Robin's Bookstore, 108 S. 13th St., 215-735-9600.