Learning: Innovation
More Minority Teachers

The key to achieving this: Get more students of color into college.

It's no secret that today's teaching force is predominantly white and female.

At NEA's recent National Summit on Diversity in the Teaching Workforce, keynote speaker Sharon Robinson, executive vice president of Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey discussed ways to attract more students of color into the education work force.

"Research shows that if we can get a higher proportion of students of color into the postsecondary pipeline, teaching does very well in the competition among career choices," says Robinson. Because a high proportion of minority college graduates choose teaching, increasing the number of minority graduates should boost the number of minority educators.

The problem, says Robinson, is that minority students leak out of the college pipeline during their K-12 years. The critical hurdles are third grade reading, fifth grade math, and seventh grade algebra--points at which some students begin to think of themselves as college material, while others don't.

In addition to the academic factors, Robinson notes that "the nature of the work of teaching needs to be revealed to them."

To achieve this, Robinson suggests internships targeted for minority students while they are in high school. Interns could tutor or mentor younger students.

"Identify those kids who find this attractive. Then in college you've got to nurture them and stay with them." she says. "Teachers are in a position to see many signs of student advancement. If the job becomes one of recognizing and nurturing student achievement, it's a joyful job. Who would turn away from that?"

A former high school English teacher, Robinson held leadership positions at the NEA and served as assistant U.S. secretary of education before moving to ETS.

"What brought me into the field was the love of a specific discipline--English and literature," she says. "And as the eldest of five children, I knew I needed to get myself ready for a career and financial independence in a hurry."

For More:
See the journal article "From High School to Teaching: Many Steps, Who Makes It?" at www.usc.edu/dept/education/CMMR/
FullText/HighSchoolToTeaching.pdf.

Mapping the Mail-Call Mentors

Monday is mail call for the fifth grade at the Reynolds Elementary School in Tucson, Arizona--a day the children know they will get letters from grown-ups around the world.

That's because NEA-Retired member Barbara Soto has set up a tightly organized E-mail mentor program for every fifth grader, more than 100 in all.

The letters are delivered on paper, so each message can be read by an adult to be sure there's nothing in it the child shouldn't see. That's just one example of the care with which Soto runs the program. She's also written a year-long set of lessons designed around the mentor E-mail. One week, she had the mentors (called "GeoPals") write about their personal heroes. They asked the children to write back about their own heroes.

The children's fifth grade teachers integrate Soto's lessons with their own. Many of the lessons involve geography, a result of Soto's training with the National Geographic Society.

Soto gets no pay for GeoPals but lots of satisfaction. "On mail-call day, the room is utterly silent while the kids read their letters," she says. "Some are poor readers, and they go over the letters slowly until they understand." When they write back, "their sentences are longer, they're more selective about adjectives. They have someone responding to their writing, and that gives it meaning."

The mentors come from 14 states and several foreign countries. They include retired newspaper editors, teachers, and many others--not all retired. Many contact Soto after reading about the project--and she's always looking for new mentors.

For More:
Visit www.education-world.com/a_curr/curr333.shtml or E-mail Soto at msplace@earthlink.net.

'Youth Press'--the Students' Voice

Mary Caton Rosser is helping young people in Wisconsin find their voice, and the rest of the Badger State is starting to listen.

Working with middle and high school students, Rosser has been nurturing writing skills and encouraging young people to use the media as an outlet for their talents. Not the mainstream press, mind you--Rosser has helped students start their own statewide newspaper, online magazine, and radio program.

For almost five years, Rosser, a writer from the University of Wisconsin Eau Claire, has presented school seminars and worked with after-school groups to build confidence in aspiring writers and to show them that, when the subject is close to their lives, they have plenty to say.

"They are tackling tough issues like sexuality, alcohol, relationships, politics, or values, and learning to approach them in a way that is informative," Rosser says. "When they know their words are reaching thousands of people, they take their work to a professional level."

Their words hit print in a highly polished, 16-page newspaper, The Youth Press of Wisconsin News. With a statewide circulation of 30,000, it's now published three times a year. Funding for the production and distribution budget of $40,000 (students are not paid for their stories) comes from the Wisconsin-based Marshfield Medical Research and Education Foundation, businesses, and several state agencies.

The paper reaches most of the state's high schools. Many copies go home with students.

"Adults tell us they gain a new perspective from everything the kids write," says Rosser.

Students produce a two-hour radio show, Rebel Radio, with music, commentary, and call-ins, broadcast once a month on WOJB-FM at the Lac Corte Oreilles Reserva-tion. An online magazine at www.youthpressmedia.com provides middle and high schoolers with an outlet for writing, photography, and art.

Rosser says some teachers are now integrating journalism into their classrooms to enliven the curriculum??for example, supplementing a history lesson with a student-organized press conference in which Martin Luther King announces a voter registration drive.

Says Rosser, "We've seen enormous growth in kids, especially students who haven't always fit into the traditional classroom."

For More:
E-mail Mary Caton Rosser at rosston@discover-net.net.

Pizza Explorer Delivers the Works

The quickest route to getting middle school and high school students interested in science just might be through their stomachs.

At least that's what Bruce Watkins, a Purdue University nutrition researcher and food science professor, thinks.

Watkins knew that teachers in the Lafayette, Indiana schools were always looking for more relevant science content. With funding from the Institute for Food Technologists, Watkins decided to cook up "The Pizza Explorer" Web site.

Imaginative cartoon characters introduce children visiting the site to a virtual pizza topped with the works. By clicking on any food ingredient, kids can learn its history, USDA nutritional assessment, and chemistry. They also learn how the food is processed. Once this information has been digested, kids can choose to take an amusing video game quiz conducted by the cartoon characters.

For More:
Visit www.efph.purdue.edu/pizza/ or www.accessexcellence.com/pizza/ to see the Pizza Explorer. E-mail Watkins at watkins@foodsci.purdue.edu.

'Vital Links' for Support Professionals

When paraeducator Anna Martin took part in a Vital Links communication training, it opened a new channel to her special needs kids. Tips on "eye messages" and body language enhanced her receptivity.

"With my kids, you really have to be able to read them, because they're often non-verbal," says Martin, who works with special education students in Baltimore County, Maryland.

Vital Links is a professional development program created by NEA for its affiliates to build more effective teamwork among education support professionals and teachers. The program trains participants in new skills, clarifies classroom and other school-related roles, and promotes cooperative understanding of individual work, communication, and conflict-resolution styles.

Martin's training was hosted by her local, the Baltimore (County Instructional) Assistants and Clerical Employees.

"Vital Links empowers people and gives them a different way of thinking," says Marcella Kehr, BACE president and a middle school paraeducator.

Since 1995, BACE has conducted a Vital Links training at least once a year, bringing K-12 instructional assistants and clerical workers together--often more than 100 each time.

"We've used all the components. We've also adapted them to our needs," Kehr notes.

The best thing about Vital Links, Kehr says, is its interactivity. "People walk in and realize, 'This isn't going to be another one of those classes where we have to listen to someone talk to us.'"

For More:
Contact Dan Hand at the NEA, 202/822-7107 or dhand@nea.org.