Groups aim to enlist people of color into teaching
David Tate Jr. has a goal of becoming president of Next Door, a nonprofit that provides early education programs for more than 1,000 low-income Milwaukee children.
Tracey Sparrow, the current president, is encouraging him.
It's not a short-term goal for Tate. He's pretty new to the field of education, currently working as an assistant teacher for 5-year-old kindergartners at Next Door. There would be a lot of steps on the ladder before he reached the top of the organization.
But there is a serious side to the conversations between him and Sparrow, and they are part of a much bigger and important picture.
To summarize the overall picture in three sentences:
There is a big need nationwide and certainly in Milwaukee and Wisconsin for people to enter and stay in education careers.
Black people and other people of color are sharply underrepresented in the ranks of teachers and school administrators.
Research has shown broadly that low-income minority students who have even one— and preferably more — teachers “who look like me” have better outcomes on multiple fronts, including graduation and success in college and careers, than students who don't have such teachers. Research also has shown that white students generally benefit from learning from teachers who come from diverse backgrounds.
This means that leaders of schools and school districts of all kinds, as well as leaders of higher education programs that train teachers, are making increasing the diversity of teaching staffs a high priority. It's one area where there is agreement on goals, and there are some signs of progress in diversifying teaching staffs.
Nevertheless, it's slow and barriers to substantial change remain high.
The Wisconsin Policy Forum, a nonprofit that analyzes public issues, put out two reports in the last year on increasing the diversity among teachers.
The first largely described the problem and found that while the percentage of students of color in Wisconsin schools increased from 23.6% in 2009 to 30.7% in 2019, the percentage of teachers of color increased only from 4.5% to 5.6%.
“In the context of Wisconsin's longstanding and severe racial achievement gaps, the severe under-representation of teachers of color in Wisconsin schools suggests the state is failing in an area that research has shown to be beneficial in promoting academic and long-term success for students of color,” the report said.
The second report analyzed barriers to increasing the number of teachers of color and pointed to changes that could be made in efforts statewide, in local school districts, and in teacher training programs. Simply giving more priority at all levels to diversity could be valuable, the report said. Recommendations included lowering financial barriers to college education for students and providing more support and mentoring to new teachers.
There are multiple efforts underway in the Milwaukee area to improve the picture. To mention several:
Milwaukee Public Schools is in constant search of teachers, and that includes teachers of color. Michael Harris, senior director of talent management for MPS, said 34% of MPS teachers are people of color. (In many school districts around Wisconsin, the percentage is zero or close to that.) But the percentage of students of color in MPS is around 90%.
“We understand that kids sitting in classrooms typically will perform better when they see someone who reflects who they are,” Harris said.
MPS is putting emphasis on training staff members who are para-professionals or who work in other roles in schools to become teachers. It is working with institutions including Viterbo University, Cardinal Stritch University and Alverno College to provide such training. Harris said 94 MPS employees recently completed training to become special education teachers, and the large majority were people of color.
Schools outside of MPS are also working to give employees paths to becoming teachers. Robert Rauh, head of the four Milwaukee College Prep charter
“We understand that kids sitting in classrooms typically will perform better when they see someone who reflects who they are.” Michael Harris senior director of talent management for MPS
schools, said such efforts in cooperation with Concordia University were paying “huge dividends.”
The City Forward Collective, a nonprofit that supports improvement efforts at many schools, is part of several efforts to increase the number of teachers of color. It offers grants to support such efforts in MPS, charter schools and private schools. It also is providing training for hiring teams from schools, and is supporting a marketing campaign to encourage people of color to go into teaching.
“The research clearly points to the fact that life outcomes and academic outcomes for students of color are proportionate to the opportunity they have” to have teachers of similar backgrounds to them," said Patricia Hoben, president and executive director. “To me, it’s follow the data.”
The Leading Men Fellowship, with efforts in several large cities, is in its third year in Milwaukee. It focuses on two things that don’t get much attention, recruiting men to be educators and encouraging them particularly to work with pre-school or kindergarten-age children. The program recruits 10 Black high school graduates a year from Milwaukee to work as aides in early childhood programs, with the goal of getting them on track for college and careers in early childhood education.
One Fellow, Elijah Wortham, spent this year working with children enrolled in the Malaika Early Learning Center on the north side. “Working with kids is something I always wanted to do,” he said. He intends to go to Milwaukee Area Technical College in the fall and to pursue a career in the field.
David Tate was in the first Milwaukee group of Fellows, starting at an MPS elementary school. Working at Next Door followed and he hopes to continue there. Tate said more people like him would go into education if they were more aware of paths to succeed and support for succeeding.
Will Tate make it to the presidency of Next Door? Stay tuned. But, as the priority for bringing people such as him into education grows, and paths for doing that are supported, he may become a leader in improving an important facet of reaching better outcomes for lowincome children.
Alan J. Borsuk is senior fellow in law and public policy at Marquette Law School. Reach him at alan.borsuk@marquette.edu.