Video: UPDATED - MORE and Teacher Diversity Committee at Panel for Educational Policy Nov 25, 2014

Teaching has often been a way for poor people from the city to join the ranks of the middle class. I'm an example of this.... Pearson, King, Tisch and Cuomo have been dismantling this tradition.... It is the gentrification of the teaching force....As someone who has been a dean, chapter leader and mentor, I see the difference between the way gentrifiers deal with NYC kids and native NYers deal with NYC kids. In short, we need many many more native NYers in the classroom, especially New Yorkers of color.
.....Assailed Teacher, blogger

Last night a batch of MOREistas were at the PEP to argue a number of points. Eterno covered ATRs. I touched on bully principals and a discontinued guidance counselor from Staten Island made a powerful statement (videos to follow). Sean Ahern and Megan Moskop joined others from the Teacher Diversity Committee to press for a more diverse and balanced teaching staff. Video below and at the MORE you tube site: http://youtu.be/g1_RDCkWLUM

Sean has been fighting this battle for a decade and is finally getting noticed by the DOE and the UFT - but outcomes do count.
I was going to speak about the lack of balance in terms of the racial composition of teaching staffs around the city. We find a lot of teachers of color in the poorest areas of the city - Harlem, Crown Heights, Bed-Stuy - the overwhelming majority in some schools and overwhelmingly white staffs in other areas.

This is often unfair to the teachers of color who are more likely to be teaching in the tougher schools.

Bloomberg got rid of a provision that allowed teachers of color to transfer based on race in 2005. You know the drill - principals should not be forced to take a teacher they don't want - even if the real issue is the decision might be based on racial bias - which by the way, can also work both ways - a white teacher had a tough time getting a job in the 70s in certain schools. But the racial bias is way more likely to work the other way. All power to the principals must be curbed and maybe this is the way to begin. It is time for the DOE to take a look at the racial imbalance in schools around the city.

I included an excerpt from Assailed Teacher in the video. Read the entire quote in my post yesterday: Impact on Teacher Diversity: Teacher Certifications Decline As NYS Uses Tougher Exams

Teacher Diversity Petition

MORE is helping sponsor this action of the work of the Teacher Diversity Committee, an independent group of teachers affiliated with MORE.

Anyone who has been around for a while knows that Sean Ahern (who was one of the founders - co-conspirators) of ICE) has been relentless in his pursuit of this issue over the past decade. I think we all learned a lesson when Sean took things to a new level by calling meetings around the issue and reaching out to all corners of the education landscape. Bit by bit the committee has attracted a diverse group of people who have been working with Sean. Below are some of the fruits of their labors. Please sign.

Increase Teacher Diversity in New York City

August 14, 2014 — Leave a comment

Sign the petition here

Petition by Teacher Diversity Committee

To be delivered to Carmen Fariña and The New York City Panel for Educational Policy

Since the 2001-2002 academic year, there has been a 57.4% decrease in the number of Black teachers hired by the New York City Department of Education, and a 22.9% increase for white teachers hired during this same period of time. We ask Chancellor Fariña and the Panel for Education Policy to:
• Make a policy statement that acknowledges the value of teacher diversity and the lack of such diversity in New York City public schools.
• Centrally monitor the racial demographic of hiring and firing in NYC public and charter schools. In public school data reports include the racial profile for the teachers and administrators in each school as is currently done for the students.
• Raise the percentage of Black and Latino teachers hired in the system overall, with a special focus on raising the percentage of male teachers in those groups.
• Raise the percentage of persons of color in the NYC Teaching Fellows program to more closely match the NYC student body demographic. Make public the number and racial demographic of NYC Teaching Fellows hired.
• Settle Gulino vs. Board of Education, in which a recent court ruling found that the NY State LAST certification exam was not validated yet was used in 2002 to dismiss thousands of NYC teachers who were disproportionately Black and Latino.
• Invest in a clear and distinct paraprofessional-to-teacher career path that offers qualified applicants provisional teaching licenses while completing graduate degree requirements and subsidizes both undergraduate and graduate tuition at CUNY and SUNY

PETITION BACKGROUND

In a school system that is 67.5% Black and Latino (as of 2012 – 13), the 34% combined percentage of Black and Latino teachers in the system is disappointing at best.
This lack of diversity reinforces already existing practices of segregation and leaves out diverse cultural perspectives that inform curriculum, pedagogy and practice. It also shortchanges our students by replicating and reinforcing false societal structures that devalue the contribution and perspectives of non-dominant racial and cultural groups.

Full Link and to sign http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/increase-teacher-diversity?source=c.tw&r_by=1921406