Teacher Inequality In Poor And Minority Schools Cointinues In New York State

Despite rhetoric from the Governor, NYSED, and the Chancellors of NYS and NYC, teacher inequality continues in the poor and minority schools of New York State.  In a report by the State conclusively shows that the poor and minority schools suffer from higher teacher turnover.  Moreover, these schools are staffed with inexperienced teachers, teachers not certified in the subjects they are teaching in, and have lower evaluation ratings than other schools.

The report goes on to show the familiar socioeconomic and racial disparity that the Race to the Top (RttT) was supposed to eliminate with an influx of $700 million dollars that is now all spent by the State with little educational result. Most disturbing is how teacher inequality continues in the schools with the highest percentage of poor and minority students, especially in the big cities.  In a takeaway from the report is the following statement.

In a quarter of schools with the highest percentage of poor and nonwhite students, more than 7 percent of teachers were in their first year, compared to less than 2 percent at the whitest and most affluent quartile of schools in 2013-14. And while less than 1 percent of teachers in those schools were deemed “not highly qualified” — because they lacked an appropriate college degree or teaching license — that rate was between 6.9 percent and 8.8 percent in less affluent schools.

How can these schools close the student academic achievement gap when these schools suffer from not only funding issues but staffing issues?  In fact, the report was able to link schools with a large percentage of "high needs" students with low-rated teachers (of course the teachers may have been low rated because they have high needs students based upon the junk Science of the Value Added Method),  According to the report, blacks are twice as likely to have "ineffective" teachers than white students. 

The report recommended that school districts recruit top-rated teachers to work in the lowest performing schools.  Good luck achieving that goal.  In New York City, the DOE is willing to give a teacher a measly  $5,000 and I believe no top rated teacher is willing to give up a position in a good school for such a small sum of pocket change and be exposed to an "ineffective" rating based upon the junk science of VAM for teaching "high needs" students. 

With a teacher shortage looming and few top college recruits willing to be a career teacher, look for the racial/income student academic achievement gap and teacher inequality to continue as the few top quality teachers will only work in the most academically sound learning environments that can only be found in the higher achieving schools.