WEB DESK: Rejected from school and called a monster, Noeila Garella, is now a teacher of her own class at 31. 

In the face of prejudice, she is the first person with Down syndrome to work as a preschool teacher in Argentina - and one of the few in the world, reports The Independent.

“I adore this. Ever since I was little, I have always wanted to be a teacher, because I like children so much,” she tells AFP. “I want them to read and listen, because in society people have to listen to one another.”

A genetic condition, Down syndrome typically affects a person's physical and intellectual growth. In Garella's case, it has done nothing to diminish her optimism and self-belief.

Standing by her side, her mother, Mercedes Cabrera, looks tearful when her daughter tells the story of the day care center director who told Garella's parents: “No monsters here.”

But Garella smiles. “That teacher is like a story that I read to the children,” she says.

“She is a sad monster, who knows nothing and gets things wrong. I am the happy monster.”

This article originally appeared in The Independent.