Paraprofessional to Teacher Pathways: The Future of Education
Across the country, various states have already, or are in the process of, implementing a number of means by which paraprofessionals can access pathways to teacher licensure. Several scholars have talked about the importance of promoting these pathways in order to increase teacher diversity and promote student community, success, and engagement, while increasing the longevity of teachers within the workforce. These newer actualized efforts to cultivate homegrown talent and diversify the teacher workforce have started shifting the landscape of who is teaching within classrooms today.
In Massachusetts, however, the teacher workforce is comprised of nearly 90% white teachers, while 44% of students in the state are students of color*. Fortunately, nonprofits like JET have been working to see a shift in this demographic. JET has provided this opportunity for well over 100 paraprofessionals since its start as an organization, and has developed collaborative partnerships with 13 urban school districts across the state. Not only that, but a majority of JET scholars are folks of color, and so we are starting to see a change in who is working with students.
JET’s work in teacher diversification has caught the attention of multiple stakeholders. Andrew Epifanio, a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Education Policy program and current education policy analyst, noted the promise of JET’s work in this area. He and his former graduate school peers discovered JET when tasked with providing policy recommendations to help diversify the educator workforce in Massachusetts as part of a public sector consulting project during his master's program.
“JET stands at the precipice of opportunity,” Andrew says. “In the current state of the system, we see a dwindling pipeline of people who become educators. But research suggests that if you give paraprofessionals the necessary resources, they may be more likely to stay in the profession. We also know that students who have teachers that look like them tend to have better educational outcomes—a scenario which paraprofessionals could help us better realize if we create pathways for them. Moreover, paraprofessionals who later become teachers facilitate the opportunity for more long-term, trusting relationships in students’ lives, and the evidence is clear about the importance of stable relationships with caring adults in children’s life outcomes***. This is the opportunity that JET presents.”
We are starting to see how JET’s and many other non-profit and advocacy groups’ proactive work in this area is beginning to affect change at a policy level in Massachusetts. A bill called the Educator Diversity Act was recently introduced to the Massachusetts State Legislature that proposed mechanisms for diversifying the teacher workforce.
Though there is a long way to go, organizations like JET and policymakers committed to the cause across the nation are diligently working to see this shift through.
Sources:
* Massachusetts Department of Education (2021-2022): Race/Ethnicity and Gender Staffing Report: https://profiles.doe.mass.edu/statereport/teacherbyracegender.aspx
** Haselkorn, D., & Fideler, E. (1996). Breaking the class ceiling: Paraeducator pathways to teaching. (ED398184). ERIC. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED398184
*** Villegas, A. M., & Clewell, B. C. (1998, Spring). Increasing teacher diversity by tapping the paraprofessional pool. Theory Into Practice, 37(2), 121–130. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1477293