You make great points. My question is: What do you see as the next steps that are needed to retain teachers of color? If we are talking about creating systemic change, what do you envision that should ultimately look like (assuming school districts and states eventually really do listen to teachers of color who share their experiences)?
I ask because I have seen teachers of color and allies speak to this and advocate for this for years in most of the communities I’ve lived in (Oakland, Seattle, Baltimore). There are forums at the city and district levels, there are race and equity advisory committees to superintendents, some cities talk of creating “pipelines” (to mentor and financially bolster promising youth of color to become teachers in their own communities). So many important ideas and experiences are shared. And though there have been a lot of listening and one-off outreach events, I see little actual movement from the top (districts and states) in terms of admitting there needs to be next steps, let alone implementing increased support of/for teachers of color.
Historically there has technically been funding from grants in a number of “turnaround schools” for parent coordinators, family outreach coordinators, graduation specialists, increased resources for diversity and equity training for staff, and a recognition that we need to hire waaay more bilingual staff. One of the challenge I’ve witnessed to schools securing the staff with the skills they need is that for some reason (racism??), these grants are often budgeted out to offer low wages for this work. I’ve seen both school budgets and job postings for parent coordinators pay $18,000 a year (no benefits), “graduation specialists” requiring a masters in social work or school counseling and multilingual skills paying $14/hr, community school coordinators: low $30,000s. Educators and community members of color (who often have school loans to pay back) usually cannot afford to do this work on such low wages. (And this is a bit of an aside, but the same turnaround grants pay literacy and/or math specialist coaches much higher salaries. The literacy specialist who was hired to work in a school I taught in was paid $800/day from this grant!)
I bring this up, not to attempt to poke holes in your proposal. I agree these are all necessary steps to take to support retaining teachers of color. Teachers of color who are doing so much extra community work to meet the needs of their students should be respected for it and shown that respect via compensation for their time. I guess I have also seen some of these pieces already technically in place and am wondering what you see as the next steps after these. As an educator, as a public education advocate, and now also as a parent of children who will be students in public schools, I want to make sure I am advocating for what teachers of color know to be best practices.
Thank you for your important contribution to teaching and to public education in general!
