Teachers are more likely to vacate schools serving high proportions of low-achieving, low-income and minority students for more economically and educationally advantaged schools.
Is Utah’s teacher turnover rate in education centered around certain biases of underserved demographics? According to the report from the Learning Policy Institute on teacher supply, demand and shortages in the U.S., inner-city schools have a higher turnover rate than suburban schools. Inner city schools have four times as many young uncertified teachers, compared to low-minority suburban schools.
College graduates with no prior education training have three times higher turnover rate. Seventy percent of teachers leaving the profession are young first-year teachers who are often alienated from communities, deceptive in finding cultural bridges, attrited and fatigued by standardized and generic curriculums that fail to teach students.
Utah’s alternative pathway to teacher licensure opens the doors to inexperienced college grads entering the teaching profession. The fault of individuals struggling to teach in an occupation that demands so much liability and responsibility, rest on policymakers who degrade the credentials of educated teachers. In this post-neoliberal economic recession, the state and district leaders are responsible for the dramatic teacher-turnover rates. Communities deserve qualified, effective teachers. Teachers should be prepared to help battle social injustices involving praxis that incorporate critical pedagogy, cultural studies, and critical race theory, in order to sustain underserved communities.
Michael Brzozowski, Sandy
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