Pushedto Teach: Pedagogies and Policies for a Black Women Educator Pipeline

Abstract

This research study examines the learning experiences of 11th-and 12th-grade Black girls participating in a precollegiate program committed to increasing the number of Teachers of Color entering the profession by viewing a teaching career as an act of social justice committed to educational equity. The pipeline functions as an education reform structure to disrupt pedagogies and policies that push Black girls out of educational spaces at disproportionate rates by instead pushing Black girls to teach. Critical race and Black feminist theories are utilized to analyze interviews from Black girls over a 5-year period of the program and composite characters are developed to spotlight key findings that allow us to (a) better understand and amplify the collective learning and socialemotional experiences of Black girls in the program, (b) highlight and critique the challenges and possibilities for positively pushing Black girls' intellectual identities as students and future teachers via pedagogies and supports, (c) identify spaces and structures in schools that can resist and combat the marginalization of Black girls' agency and genius, and (d) consider implications for the development of Black Women Educator pipelines.

Integrating Feminist Theory, Pedagogy, and Praxis into Teacher Education

“…Gist et al (2018) advanced this argument into the 21st century, and both agreed with duBois that "feminist scholars are engaged in an almost archeological endeavor-that of discovering and uncovering the actual facts of women's lives and experiences, facts that have been hidden inaccessible, suppressed, distorted, misunderstood, and ignored" (in Weiler, 1988, p. 62). Gist et al (2018) furthered the conversation to expand specifically for African American women, advocating that teachers using these approaches "cultivate safe and open classroom spaces (counterspaces) that allow for and center multiple and fluid experiences of Black girlhood in classroom discussion and learning communities" (p. 72). Gist et al (2018) advocated as a result that teacher education programs urge teachers to "create opportunities for Black girls to create and share knowledge about their own lives and experiences through school and community-based Black girl listening sessions, conferences, and writing projects" (p. 73).…”

“…Attention to increasing voice, both in preservice female teachers and in translating that to students, is also part of this increased need. Ollis (2017) asserted that "developing an explorative, fluid, nuanced approach that explores multiple subject positions and 'truths' remains a challenge " (p. 470 (Burke, 2017;Irby et al, 2002); • • for challenge to "sentimentalist and moralistic discourses that often obscure inequality and justice" (Hudson-Vassell et al, 2018, p. 140); • • for liberatory and humanizing goals as artifacts (Gist et al, 2018;Roberts, 2019) of counter-hegemonic practices in teacher education.…”

“…Grissom and Redding (2016) pointed out the statistics supporting the fact that teachers identify African American girls less for gifted and accelerated programs, and both White (2016) and Gist et al (2018) suggested advocacy and education for preservice teachers around preventing communities of color from being reorganized and privately managed as a means of segregation and control. With similar concerns, Annamma et al (2019) pointed out the data behind the fact that the school to prison nexus is just as true for African American female students as it is for males, both disproportionately represented, and Gist et al (2018) followed up with this concern by describing suspension rates of African American girls along with dehumanizing school policies structured in a way that frames African American girls' behavior issues as disproportionately disruptive, angry and violent, or out of control. Although this kind of discrimination and racism has always been as issue, and one that preservice programs have tried to address before in healthy portions, the increased emphasis on the status of African American girls is newer and shows an area of study in sharper focus perhaps.…”

Teaching in Community Schools: Creating Conditions for Deeper Learning

“…For example, community school teachers with experience managing after-school programs will be better prepared to connect students’ learning across contexts and work alongside other community school professionals. In addition to bringing this valuable work experience to the role of community school teacher, Grow Your Own programs also aim to develop teachers of color who share the background and experiences of their students (Carver-Thomas, 2018; Gist, White, & Bianco, 2018). Teachers’ race and ethnicity have important consequences for students of color that underscore the need to diversify the teaching workforce.…”

The Critical Educators of Color Pipeline: Leveraging Youth Research to Nurture Future Critical Educators of Color

“…Addressing some of the limitations of traditional pipeline programs, a few empirical studies illuminate how pre-collegiate programs can deliberately recruit and support secondary students from historically marginalized backgrounds to become critical educators. Researchers prioritizing diversity in teacher education implore pipeline programs to specifically examine ways to support historically marginalized groups, such as young Black girls, at the intersection of race, class and gender in order to enter the profession as disrupters of educational inequities (Gist et al 2018). Teachers for Tomorrow in Patterson, New Jersey, highlights the possibilities of implementing a curriculum focused on igniting interest among minoritized youth through a critical pedagogy that includes theoretical underpinnings such as critical race theory (Hill and Gillette 2005).…”