African-American College Students are the Focus of Teacher Recruiters for the Boston Public School System

About one half of all the students in the Boston public school system are black. Another 33 percent of the students in the school system are Hispanic. But only 25 percent of the teachers in the city’s schools are black, the same level that prevailed a decade ago.

New programs have recently been implemented to increase the number of blacks teaching at the city schools. Current teachers are paid to make recruiting visits to black fraternities and sororities at local colleges. Black teachers’ aides are given scholarships so they can earn their teaching certificates, and special recruitment efforts are being made at black colleges and universities in the South. One advantage the recruiters have is that the average teacher salary in Boston’s schools is $69,022, one of the highest rates for a city school system in the country.

The school system has made better progress in hiring black principals. Blacks are now nearly one half of all principals in the city school system, an increase of 58 percent from a decade ago.