.
August 31, 2016
Read full article
Airing Tonight on PBS NewsHour: Bridging the Cultural Divide Between Teachers and Students (An Education Week Report)
As the student population in America's public schools becomes increasingly diverse, one thing has remained fairly constant. The nation's teaching force remains predominantly white. The divide is especially prevalent in urban districts like Chicago, where nearly 90 percent of public school students are black or Hispanic and fewer than half the teachers are.
These differences can impact the classroom and student performance as personal biases and cultural misunderstandings get in the way of learning. Most teacher-preparation programs attempt to address this issue through what's called cultural-competency training, but there are questions about whether such courses remove or reinforce such biases.
The Chicago Teacher Education Pipeline at Illinois State University takes a step beyond conventional classroom training by immersing their teacher candidates in Chicago's highest-need communities—part of a month-long intensive fellowship called STEP-UP.
Education Week Correspondent Lisa Stark follows some of these aspiring teachers through the program to see how the training is preparing them for life in the classroom, tonight on PBS NewsHour.
LEARN MORE TONIGHT ON PBS NEWSHOUR.