Teacher Housing: A Critical Policy Analysis of Educator Housing Programs in Four Cities

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 2
  In Roundtable Session: Teacher Demographics: The Promises and Possibilities of Teaching in the United States and Abroad

Abstract

This paper offers a critical policy analysis of educator housing—a burgeoning strategy to recruit and retain teachers, often led by district leaders and philanthropists concerned about chronic teacher shortage and turnover. The paper situates educator housing in larger struggles related to neoliberal urbanism, the racialization of space, and the social costs of land use. Using interviews with district leaders and developers in four cities, the paper describes the broad aims and characteristics of four educator housing programs, their impact on retention and classroom instruction, and critically examines whether and how the programs were complicated by the politics of urban development and issues of spatial alienation of community stakeholders. Ultimately, we recommend ideal and non-ideal models of educator housing.

Authors

• Jackquelin Bristol, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Terrenda Corisa White, University of Colorado-Boulder