Knock Before You Enter: Reconceptualizing Retention Through Women Educators of Color, Fugitive Professional Development

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Wednesday 12:40 pm Four Seasons Ballroom 1
  In Roundtable Session: CERECG SIG Round Table 2: Resistance and Retention of Educators through Black Resistance, Black Love, and Black Futures (Table 2)

Abstract

Women educators of color (WEOC) are disproportionately underrepresented in the US teacher workforce and have a higher turnover rate than their White counterparts. The shortage of teachers of color (TOC) and WEOC, in particular, in public schools raises questions about the efficacy of districts’ retention efforts. This critical ethnographic study investigated, from the unique perspectives of women of color (WOC), the experiences of WEOC in a leadership and retention professional development program. Findings reveal four salient themes, including participants' belief in the permanence of gendered racism as well as retention as freedom to dream—to be whoever they chose to be inside or outside education. Recommendations are offered for districts committed to implementing professional development for the purposes of retaining WEOC.

Authors

• Abiola Farinde-Wu, University of Massachusetts - Boston

• Elyse Seltzer, University of Massachusetts - Boston