“Over the past two decades, the K-12 student population has become much more racially diverse, but that same trend in diversity is not reflected in teachers and school leaders,” says Dr. Javaid Siddiqi, president and CEO of the Hunt Institute.

Local programs like the teacher residency program in Charlotte or this scholar teacher program in Edgecombe County are addressing the issue one district at a time while they wait for systemwide policy change to take hold at the state and national level.

What’s happening statewide in North Carolina

“We need desperately more diverse public school teachers,” said Gov. Roy Cooper last week at a convening of leaders from the state’s historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs).

“Many of you participated in the task force I created — the DRIVE task force — which works to get more diversity among our public educators because the studies are pretty stark. Not only do minority students do better when their teachers are more diverse, but all students do better when their teachers are more diverse,” said the governor.

DRIVE stands for “Developing a Representative & Inclusive Vision for Education.” The task force was created by executive order in December 2019. Here are the appointees.

The DRIVE task force, supported by the team at the Hunt Institute, is working now to implement its recommendations and build momentum.

Read the full article about the DRIVE task force by Mebane Rash at The 74.