Giving Compass' Take:

· New research from National Academies states the importance of diversifying the teacher workforce and matching students with same-race teachers to boost success.

· How can districts support diversifying the teacher workforce?  Why is it so important for them to do so?

· Here's more about putting teacher diversity at the forefront.


Teachers are expected to have strong content knowledge, to create deeper learning experiences for their students and to understand their social-emotional development — demands that weren’t placed on educators 20 years ago, according to a report released Wednesday by the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine.

But teacher preparation programs generally don’t have ways of tracking how their graduates perform in the classroom, and there is little evidence newer preservice models, such as residencies and online programs, are effective at preparing students for increasingly diverse classrooms, the authors conclude.

“Teaching has always been complicated and difficult, but it’s gotten even more so in a number of ways,” said Robert Floden, dean of the College of Education at Michigan State University and chair of the 13-member ad hoc committee that wrote the report.

A collaboration between the Board on Higher Education and Workforce and the Board on Science Education, the 15-month project looked at how the teacher workforce has changed over the past two decades and what it means for teacher training programs and those providing professional development once they are in the classroom.

Read the full article about diversifying the teacher workforce by Linda Jacobson at Education Dive.