New Avenues for Recruiting Latino Male Teachers

By Malik Russell

For well over a decade, the Latino Teacher Program at the University of Southern California’s (USC) Rossier School of Education has helped Latino paraprofessionals transition into the role of full-time teacher in the public school system.

The program has faced many challenges, including California’s Proposition 227 which many believed would reduce bilingual education programs as well as the challenges inherent in recruiting teachers of color to the public school system. Despite these challenges, it has continued to survive and develop into a model program culling data on successful strategies for recruiting and training Latinos, and specifically paraprofessionals.

The L2mtp program seeks out paraeducators throughout the Los Angeles area. They must come from schools eligible to participate in the program and are enrolled full time in classes at universities that help them become certified to teach in California.

The eligible paraeducators must be currently enrolled in undergraduate programs; or pursuing graduate course work for teacher certification; or enrolled in a community college with the intentions of transferring to a four-year school to graduate with teacher credentials.

L2mtp provides its students with financial support and assistance as well as surrounding them with mentors and social interactions all designed to keep them on track and make the transition easier. The program is open to male and female applicants.
Well over a decade after the program begin, its success has become noted and accolades have poured in.

L2tmp is one of only 12 programs considered exemplary by the Department of Education for recruiting underrepresented groups into bilingual education. Additionally it represents one of nine programs highlighted by the national study “Breaking the Class Ceiling: Paraeducators Pathways to Teaching,” which examined making the transition from paraprofessional to a full- time teacher.

The program is run by USC and managed with a diverse consortium of partners including, USC;  UCLA; CSU-Los Angeles; California State University Dominguez Hills; Loyola Marymount University; The Los Angeles Unified School District; Little Lake City School District; Lennox School District;  The Los Angeles County Office of Education; The Los Angeles City and County School Employees Union, Local 99 of the Service Employees International Union, representing the paraeducators; and United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), representing teachers.

Still strong and viable, their mission is to simply “to increase the number of Latinos(as) and language minorities in the teaching profession by creating a career track for practicing language minority paraeducators.”
For more information, visit: http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~cmmr/LTP.html