Celebrating Black History Month: Voices Across the CSP
As the nation celebrates Black History Month, the National Charter School Resource Center (NCSRC) shares reflections from grantees of the Charter School Programs (CSP) on what it means to them to advance educational opportunities for Black students across the country through their CSP grant.
Dr. Lisa Long
Executive Director, Charter Schools Office
New York State Education Department
State Entity Grantee
"Working to authorize charter schools in New York State has given us the opportunity to partner with our state’s most innovative educators and community members to ensure that every child has access to the right educational resources. We are opening new possibilities for Black students, who have been historically underserved and marginalized in education. Through our CSP grant, we have been able to assist charter schools using a service-oriented approach as an essential strategy in support of our state’s equity goals.”
Khaliff Davis, CFA
Senior Director, Lending and Investments
Reinvestment Fund
Credit Enhancement Grantee
"As the leader of the education financing portfolio at Reinvestment Fund, advancing educational opportunities for Black children means supporting the school environments that affirm and promote the dreams of Black children and their families. It also means lifting up the voices of this community and creating the conditions for them to excel. Schools play a part in the emotional, physical, and intellectual wellbeing of America’s future. The CSP program enables us to go further in our supports for schools that foster equitable success especially for those that expand opportunity for Black children and the communities they come from."
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New NCSRC Resources Provide Strategies to Help Charter Schools Recruit, Hire, and Sustain Teachers of Color
Based on pre-pandemic data, approximately 70% of the students attending charter schools were students of color while only 32% of teachers in charter schools were teachers of color. In our increasingly diverse society, representation matters. Research shows that all students benefit from having a diverse group of teachers that come from a variety of backgrounds as they prepare to enter an increasingly global society. So how can charter schools ensure their teaching staff is diverse racially, ethnically, and linguistically?
NCSRC has released a new report and webinar dedicated to providing charter school leaders with strategies to recruit, hire, and sustain teachers of color. These resources:
- Share research on the importance of having a diverse teacher workforce;
- Showcase Drew Charter School and DSST Public Schools efforts to successfully implement strategies for recruiting, hiring, and sustaining teachers of color; and
- Provide key strategies and reflection questions to help bolster your own efforts in creating a diverse team of teachers to impact your student’s academic achievement.
By diving into the key concepts and strategies shared in these resources, charter schools will be empowered to adjust their recruiting, hiring, and sustaining efforts to ensure their educator workforce best serves the needs of their students.
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Creating A Community of Care within Your Charter School
Supporting student mental health is a critical component in the recovery from the pandemic. NCSRC has created a suite of new resources aimed at helping charter schools develop systems that support student mental health through communities of care. The publication shares strategies for comprehensive and responsive support systems and the recorded webinar brings the concepts to life with an interview featuring Uplift Education’s Chief Well-Being and SEL Officer Dr. John Gasko. The accompanying workbook provides tools for school leaders to use with their teams to create their own community of care.
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NCES Fast Facts for Black History Month
The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has compiled data on the learning experiences of Black students and educators.
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Allocating School Resources National Dissemination Grant Spotlight: The A-GAME
The Institute for Excellence in Education is a recipient of an FY22 CSP National Dissemination Grant supporting its Advancing Great Authorizing and Modeling Excellence program, known as the A-GAME. The goals for this work are to improve student engagement and performance, especially those most impacted by COVID-19; shift charter school authorizers’ improvement strategies from reactive to proactive; and build local capacity for all charter school authorizers to be able to create A-GAME responsive goals, context curated early warning systems, and resource mapping. The A-GAME Community is now welcoming new authorizer members. You can learn more about this initiative, and other programs offered by the Institute for Excellence in Education, by visiting their website.