Amanda Fernandez: Latinos Answering the Call for Social Justice Through Teach for America: This coming school year a record 5,800 new Teach For America teachers will enter the nation's highest-need schools, including 550 who identify as Latino. This marks the largest incoming Latino corps in Teach For America's 23-year history. With these incoming teachers, 10,000 first- and second-year Teach For America corps members will collectively reach more than 750,000 students -- 40 percent of whom are Latino -- across 46 regions in 36 states and the District of Columbia. This puts Teach For America among the largest single providers of Latino public school teachers in the country. Who are these Latinos and why did they decide to join this effort?
While the misconception that Teach For America teachers are all people of privilege continues to persist, there is an aspect of truth in that our teachers, including our Latino teachers, have enjoyed the privilege of access to a college degree and many have had the benefit of someone in their life supporting them to persist in their educational pursuits.
