Degrees of Diversity

Christopher Fields is rare in the teaching profession. He’s an African-American man, and he teaches sixth-grade English at East Lower School. According to the U.S. Department of Education, you'd have to stop by more than 50 classrooms in this country before you found one black male teacher.

On a recent afternoon, Musette Castle was sifting through a stack of books on her dining room table: The Old Man and the Sea by Hemingway; Dubliners by Joyce; Catch 22 by Heller. The books come from her grandson Louis’ high school English class reading list. Castle, who is African-American, pointed out that the authors and protagonists are almost all white.

A WXXI News investigation finds that local districts have a severe lack of diversity on teaching staffs. Five public school districts have zero African-American teachers on staff; four districts have just one, according to the numbers from the 2015-16 school year.

In Monroe County and the Finger Lakes, thousands of students could graduate high school without ever seeing a black teacher in their school hallways.