Changing Expectations for the K-12 Teacher Workforce Policies, Preservice Education, Professional Development, and the Workplace (2020) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
2 Contextual Factors That Shape the Current Teacher Workforce
2 Contextual Factors That Shape the Current Teacher Workforce
Pages 19-38
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From page 19... ...
The increasing diversity of the classroom in terms of student demographics has outpaced the changes in the demographics of teachers, resulting in a deepening mismatch between the makeup of the teacher workforce and the student population in public schools. The chapter concludes with a discussion of changes in federal legislation related to elementary and secondary education since 2000.
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Race and Ethnicity3 Data in Table 2-1 show that the number of Black teachers has remained relatively steady over the past 20 years, whereas there has been an 1 All demographic data about the U.S. teacher workforce population cited in this chapter are from Goldring et al.
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From page 21... ...
The author found that the desegregation process following the CRA led to reductions in the employment of Black teachers in the south and that southern school districts both increased recruitment of white teachers following the loss of Black teachers, or reduced the number of teachers employed overall. Furthermore, approximately one-half of the Black teachers who left teaching jobs entered other, lower skilled professions in the South.
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increase of roughly 2.5 percent in the number of Hispanic teachers over the same time period. As Figure 2-1 demonstrates, in the past decade, Latinx teachers have supplanted Black teachers as the most represented teachers of color: in 2015, 8.8 percent of teachers were Latinx, whereas Black teachers made up only 6.7 percent of the workforce.
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. Among high school science and math teachers, 91 percent of teachers identify as White (Banilower et al., 2018)
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Whereas women make up the majority of the teaching staff at schools throughout the United States, the proportion of male teachers increases as grade level increases. This remains particularly true in the STEM content areas, with men making up 40 percent of high school math teachers and 43 percent of high school science teachers, as compared to 36 percent of high school teachers generally (Banilower et al., 2018; Taie and Goldring, 2017)
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Although one option for trying to create more purposeful role models for students of color would be to place more teachers of color in schools serving high concentrations of students of color, the committee argues that it is important that all teachers are able to recognize and leverage the various assets students are bringing into the classroom, and receive some preparation to respond to the shifting population of students (the ways in which the makeup of the student population has changed will be described in the next section)
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. Race and Ethnicity One of the major changes in student demographics over the period from 2000 to 2015 is the decline in the percentage of White students in the K–12 public school population from 61 percent to 49 percent.5 In 2015, 50 percent of the students enrolled in public schools were students of color (i.e., Black, Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaska Native, and two or more races6)
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ELs constitute a sizable and fast-growing segment of the K–12 student population in the United States: nearly 5 million students are classified as ELs in K–12 public schools, making up about 10 percent of total stu dents enrolled (McFarland et al., 2018)
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. The low-income category includes individuals who would qualify as poor (defined as below 100% of the federal poverty threshold [FPT]
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However, compared to a decade ago, students identified as needing special services are slightly more likely to be educated inside a regular education classroom than pulled out and served through a designated special education classroom. In 2008, 58.5 percent of students needing special services received 80 percent or more of their instruction in a regular classroom compared to 63 percent in 2016.10 Close to one-half of students categorized with multiple disabilities or intellectual disabilities received their education inside a regular classroom less than 40 percent of the time (Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, 2018)
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have always existed within special education populations; however, prior to 1991 they were identified as eligible for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act services by meeting other category criteria such as mental retardation or speech impairment (Brock, 2006)
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Specifically, the law required that all U.S. public schools test and report student achievement in mathematics and English language arts (and eventually science)
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. Although there have been a number of criticisms of NCLB, implementation of the law shed light on student populations that had historically been underperforming and underserved: states, schools, and districts were tasked with attending to the underperformance of any group of students, regardless of how well the school was performing overall.
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States responded by creating educator evaluation systems that considered student achievement data alongside teacher observations and other sources of evidence of student learning. These teacher evaluation systems had direct consequences for teachers.
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SUMMARY Teachers work within a larger, ever-expanding and shifting education system, characterized by ongoing federal reform efforts. The demographics of the teacher workforce have remained relatively stable, but the expectations placed on teachers have changed enormously.
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in the teacher workforce is concerning. Overall, it is clear that the work of teachers today is impacted by increased and explicit demands placed on them, demands that stem in part from accountability legislation, shifts in rigorous content standards, and the increasing diversity of students in the classroom.
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. The impact of desegregation on black teachers in the metropolis, 1970–2000.
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From page 37... ...
. School Desegregation and Black Teacher Employment.
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