As teaching shortages loom, exciting new programs are 'growing' future teachers and actively recruiting minorities into the profession

Standing well over six feet tall, Leonard Brock leaned against the wall outside the main office at Rochester's East High School. His streetwise posture belied what mentors have called a "transformation" when he works with young city children. The day before high school graduation, Brock outlined his plans.

"Next year I'm going to the University of Buffalo, where I'll get my bachelor's degree in education," he said last June. But he didn't stop there. "Then I plan to come back here to get a teaching job, and then I'll get my master's degree at the University of Rochester."

Sound presumptuous? Not really.

Brock is one of the first graduates of the Teaching and Learning Institute magnet program that was founded at East High four years ago. Led by teachers represented by the Rochester Teachers Association, the institute introduces under-represented and underserved minority students to the teaching profession, encouraging them to complete college and become teachers.

Committed to diversity

Approximately 44 percent of New York state students are ethnic minorities; only 15 percent of teachers are. Both New York State United Teachers and its national affiliate, the American Federation of Teachers, are committed to increasing minority representation in the profession.

Expected retirements over the next several years and the need for more teachers to reduce class sizes signal a potential shortage - an added inducement to step up recruitment.

In Rochester, members of the Rochester TA are part of a collaborative effort that identifies students with an interest and aptitude for teaching and gives them a running start toward a career.

The city school district has guaranteed a teaching job for any student who graduates from the magnet program and goes on to earn a teaching certificate. It's seen as a way to accomplish two things: recruit quality teachers to help replace the massive numbers of teachers who will retire in the next five to 10 years, and infuse ethnic diversity into the faculty. Nearly 80 percent of district teachers are white; more than 80 percent of students are minorities.

NYSUT's own Task Force on Minority Involvement this year developed recommendations for increasing the representation of minorities in the profession and in the union. The AFT also has called the recruitment and retention of minority teachers a "vital concern."

"We need to get the word out that the teaching profession is a way to make a difference," said NYSUT President Tom Hobart. "In particular, we need to encourage students who are ethnic minorities to consider teaching as a career."

Brock, who started high school in a law and government track, joined Rochester's TLI program as a sophomore, working for 10 weeks as a teacher aide in a second-grade class at School 28.

"The internship was what really got me to want to be a teacher," he said.

He "discovered a real talent for working with kids," said RTA member Ken Wilson, one of the leaders of the institute. "The elementary teachers he worked with talked about a total transformation when he's in front of the kids."

Laura Sirimongkhoune, one of the program's five graduates last June, had always wanted to be a pediatrician and had the requisite strengths in science and math. "But when I started the internships in the schools, I fell in love with teaching," she said. She is currently studying secondary math education at the State University at Geneseo.

Amy Battaglia, now a freshman at Monroe Community College, said teaching "was one of a few careers I was considering. I really started to fall in love with teaching" thanks to the institute.

Rigorous preparation

The internship experience taught other students a different lesson. "Some kids found out that they didn't like it," Battaglia said. And that's OK, too. They still benefited from the rigorous standards and enhanced opportunities of the program.

"We're preparing them not just for teaching careers, but for a whole range of careers," said Wilson, who recently was named an Educator of Excellence by the New York State English Council. "We feel the knowledge of that process ultimately makes them better parents, better citizens and more knowledgeable about educational issues."

The magnet program is a product of the Rochester Educational Access Collaborative, a partnership of the city school district, colleges and universities, community-based organizations and the Rochester Labor Council. It is partially funded by a grant from the Ford Foundation.

Because this is a magnet program, students from anywhere in the city can request to enter the Teaching and Learning Institute, if they have good enough grades.

Extra credits required

All institute students are enrolled in Regents-level classes, and the curriculum combines college preparatory and specialized courses. Students need 25 credits to graduate, 3.5 more than district requirements. The students also must perform 20 hours of community service in the third year and 40 hours in the senior year.

Eighteen RTA members teach the various TLI courses, but the distinguishing features of the program are the seminars, led by three East High teachers: Wilson, Laura Shortz and Liliana Rossi. These courses serve as a kind of home base for the students, and they become increasingly specific and "hands-on" as they progress.

By the third year, "my students really begin to dissect the profession," Shortz said. All this leads to the practicum, or paid elementary school internship, in their senior year, with elements of a student-teaching experience.

"It's a wonderful program for the kids, but also for the teachers," said Edgar Miranda, new director of the Xerox Center for Multicultural Education at the State University at Geneseo. A former principal at School 28, Miranda said mentor teachers welcomed the opportunity to foster young educators.

"The teachers themselves are excited because they have an opportunity to talk about their craft," said the member of United University Professions, which represents instructional and professional faculty at SUNY. "When you're put in a position where you have to articulate what you do, it refreshes you."

Community, labor partnerships

Partners in the project include community-based organizations such as Rochester's Action for a Better Community, the Memorial Art Gallery, the Museum and Science Center and the 4-H. The future educators work with children in these community programs. The goal is to expose students to many different teaching experiences.

The labor council has provided preparation for the world of work and education as a career, said Jon Garlock, a former professor and member of the Faculty Association of Monroe Community College, who heads the council's school-to-work programs.

Meanwhile, the graduate school of education at the University of Rochester and SUNY Geneseo's School of Education both provide students to the institute. The students serve as tutors. Geneseo's Xerox Center is designed to prepare young teachers to teach in culturally diverse schools and encourage under-represented minorities to go into the field. (See related article at right.)

Institute program administrator Frank Rossi said some possible incentive programs for financial aid or admissions are under discussion with area colleges. Miranda said the Xerox Center also is seeking ways to fund scholarship incentives for institute graduates, with 25 students expected to graduate next June.

"TLI is turning out to be one of the prototypes for some other career programs in the district," said Wilson, such as a budding culinary arts program, a firefighters program and a business program. It's appropriate, he said, that future educators should lead the way.

"In local unions across the state, our members are teaching students who could be the teachers of tomorrow," said NYSUT President Hobart. "At both the state and local levels, the union is committed to pursuing outreach efforts that will ensure New York state has diverse and highly qualified teachers for the new millennium."

- Hoskin