"Teach For America is growing the movement of leaders who work to ensure that kids growing up in poverty get an excellent education."
While this mission seems brilliant in theory, I cannot help but see its connection to (white) Western imperialism. It is no surprise that TFA hires predominantly white, middle to upper class, recent college graduates to spread a very specific message about how education needs to be to predominantly poor students of color. Most corps members share little to no background or life experience with their students or colleagues, yet they are charged with the duty of "transforming" education, something most are ill prepared to do.
The brutal reality is that TFA teachers are not effective. My MTLD (Manager of Teacher Learning and Development) gave me the figures for the Baltimore Corps, which has higher statistics than the national average. Only a womping 3% of first year teachers make a transformational impact, and after their second year only 7% can be considered transformational. That's six people out of the Baltimore corps. Yet, TFA is looked at as being an answer to education.
Most TFA teachers leave after their two year commitment, feeling exhausted, yet pleased that they helped out a community of poor, troubled students. However, the reality is that unless those teachers leaving were a part of that 7%, their students stayed at the same academic level or in some cases, worse.
If we really want to have transformation, we need to focus on training career teachers, rather than idealistic college grads that use TFA as a means of beefing up their resume. This gives our students a chance to have a teacher that will be more than just novice, someone who will really stick around to see them through. As it stand now, TFA's infrastructure isn't helping our kids, it's just making a bunch of predominantly white, middle-class kids feel good about serving a community that isn't theirs, while reaping the professional benefits associated with this "charitable" deed.
And while I am not trying to discount the experience of any corps member, I think it is crucial to take a step back and look at the bigger picture and message that TFA is sending. Anyone who has been to any of TFA's diversity sessions should know that TFA has an issue acknowledging the privilege that exists, and until that happens, the organization will continue to be inherently flawed. Perhaps the transformation TFA so desperately seeks needs to first be realized within themselves.
http://www.teachforamerica.org/our-mission
**I readily acknowledge that there are many corps members from a variety of backgrounds and identities. I wrote this blog to highlight social implications and theory to the general trend I see with the heavy recruitment of white corps members in TFA. I by no means am trying to discount the fact that there are people who are doing great work and joined TFA to truly make an impact.
2 comments:
Although I agree with your premise that TFA teachers aren't really transforming their students' lives, I do think that there is a place for TFA in the education reform movement. In terms of goals for the organization, my understanding of it is that it is not necessarily trying to create a corps of teachers per se, but rather a corps of leaders who can advocate about the issue of education inequality in the US (even if the reality is quite different!). That being said, it is still too early to tell what role TFA will play in the entire reform process. On a positive note, at least it has made teaching an option for many people who otherwise would not have considered it.
I'm curious to know what constitutes a 'transformational' impact on students. I'm unsure as to whether that impact can be measured. I think a corps member's impact on a student could very well be transformational for that student, but cannot be measured. For example, there are a whole plethora of reasons why a student's academic growth over the course of a year may not be considered 'transformational' by TFA standard (test scores, data excel worksheets, reading growth). However, a teacher's transparency with their own intersections of identity may change a student's worldview, thus having an immeasurable impact on that student.
This speaks to the population of TFA corps members who are conscious of their identity, of course. I agree with you, Rae. We are few. But regardless of whether the academic impact I had on Jesus was 'transformational' by TFA standard, that kid knows that he is loved unconditionally, despite his gender identity or sexuality. That's pretty transformational, I'd say.
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