Rochester City School Board president Van White has written a new children's book. It's called "Heroes," and it's about the everyday heroes in our lives: doctors, firefighters, caregivers. He joins us to talk about why he wrote the book and the importance of diversity and inclusion in literature.

Low-income students of color make up the majority of classrooms in American public schools, and research shows that the challenges they face -- poverty, homelessness, or hunger -- have directly influenced their level of academic success. While many of these children are failing to make the grade, education experts say state and federal policies are failing the students. They say there’s too much of a focus on raising test scores, and that policies should be designed to close opportunity gaps and get students excited about learning.

It's graduation season... so are the local graduates getting local jobs? It's the first in our series of conversations with freshly minted college graduates about their experiences navigating the job market. This week, we focus on the teaching profession. In studio:

When you were in school, did you learn about redlining? Did you learn about our American history of housing discrimination, and how deeply it hurt people and families of color? Many schools still don't teach this. A local teacher recently wrote to Connections, saying, "Frankly I don't think people know the history of segregation in Rochester from redlining, to zoning codes, to housing covenants, to the (1975 U.S. Supreme Court’s 5 – 4 decision) in favor of Penfield's blatantly discriminatory

At the Little Theatre in Rochester, teachers, superintendents, parents and school board members discussed ways to bring more diversity to local teaching staffs.

New York State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia sat down with WXXI Albany Correspondent Karen DeWitt to talk about WXXI's week-long series, Degrees of Diversity.

It's a special broadcast live from the Little Theatre. We're capping our week-long series exploring the lack of diversity on local teaching staffs.

It's a special broadcast live from the Little Theatre. We're capping our week-long series exploring the lack of diversity on local teaching staffs.

When local teaching jobs open up, superintendents say they rarely see candidates of color. New research indicates the pipeline has leaks at almost every stage -- from high school, through college graduation and job retention.

The WXXI News series, Degrees of Diversity, is the result of a year-long investigative reporting project that explores the wide gap between white teachers and teachers of color in the Rochester and Finger Lakes regions and beyond.