Supporting Teachers of Color

Unless your HR department has been living in a cave for the last several years, they are working on ways to increase the diversity of the teacher workforce in your district. Having more teachers of color does a number of good things for students of color, white students, and the school and district, as a whole. Providing students with educators and leaders who look like them and have shared experiences with them is an important part of feeling that the institution is designed for you and that you are not merely a guest in it. White students benefit by getting a more realistic understanding of the diversity and brilliance that exists outside artificially white spaces, like many school systems. Schools and districts only get stronger when they have more constituencies represented in their ranks. It becomes easier to account for all the different types of students and families being served.

Unfortunately, too many organizations underestimate the work that is needed to make this shift. In too many places schools are self-congratulatory about hiring a staff member of color without thinking about the degree of support that person will need being the first, or one of very few, staff members of color.

First, keep in mind that this person is probably not looking to be the Rosa Parks or Jackie Robinson of your school, they are looking for a job — and they are new at that job. Don’t complicate their first year trials by asking them to be the resident expert on every race issue that comes up, or worse, ask them to handle every difficult situation that comes up with a student or family of color. If you want a person of color to be an ombudsman or liaison with your families of color, designate the funds and create that position, don’t try to get that additional work out of a new teacher.

Second, plan for some special supports for new staff members of color. They will struggle with new teacher issues, like every other new teacher, but they will also feel alone, like no other new teacher will. They will have a harder time finding teachers who can relate to their feelings in the system. Create a network for them. Make explicit efforts to connect staff of color so they can support each other.

Third, do your homework. Oftentimes, as schools hire staff of color, they are asked to educate others about issues of race. These are often well meaning requests: “I didn’t realize it was a problem for me to touch your hair. Can you tell me more about why that’s offensive?” “I was obviously wrong in thinking this mother would find that conversation helpful, but clearly I upset her. Can you tell me what I did wrong, and how I should approach conversations about her son’s grammar in the future?” If your staff member of color wants to jump into these situations and help out, that’s fine. But, asking them to step in might be asking them to relive trauma that they grew up with. These conversations can be extraordinarily tiring and stress inducing. Especially because the white colleague is usually looking for some reassurance that they indeed are not racist, despite the racist thing they just did / said. If you want to know what touching someone’s hair without their permission is offensive or why speech patterns can be a sensitive issue, do your homework. Buy a book, read an article. Asking your colleague is the equivalent of copying someone else’s homework. White staff members need to demonstrate their commitment to anti-racism by doing their own homework, doing their own reading, and then asking if their understanding is valid.

When districts don’t take these steps in hiring staff of color they find that these new staff members get burned out quickly, become disillusioned, and start looking to leave the district or the profession. Commit to supporting your staff of color and helping public schools become the institutions of equity that they espouse to be.

Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.

— Martin Luther King Jr.