The Role of Community Colleges in Diversifying the Educator Workforce in California

Abstract

For students of Color, being taught by educators who share their racial and ethnic backgrounds has been shown to improve academic achievement and long-term educational attainment. This study focuses on California school districts, where the racial makeup of the teacher workforce does not reflect the racial makeup of the student population. However, community colleges may have the potential to strengthen and diversify the teaching profession, given teachers’ work location preferences, the accessibility and affordability of community college, and the higher enrollment of candidates of Color in community colleges. This paper investigates whether districts near a community college have an association with higher percentages of teacher-student race matching. Relying on data from the National Center for Education Statistics’ Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System and the California Department of Education’s Statewide Data Files, it finds that for California school districts, being near a community college is associated with stronger teacher-student race matching than not being near a community college.