Katie Osgood warns not to celebrate Teach for America’s drive to recruit more corps members of color.

Here are some of her reasons:

“TFA has a direct tie to the overall reduction in teachers of color in schools. The black middle class is shrinking, and TFA’s anti-union stance and its attacks on the teaching profession are inextricably linked. Current education policies-which TFA aggressively promotes-are forcing far more black educators OUT of the classroom than TFA could ever put back in. Many black educators site the worsening working conditions, the loss of job protections which disproportionately affect African American teachers, and the effects of neoliberal edreform policies around school closings, turnarounds, and charter proliferation as reasons why many are leaving/being forced to leave the profession. TFA spouts the virtues of teachers of color out of one side of their mouth while they spit on veteran black educators out of the other. This loss of black educators was perhaps most dramatically seen in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina when TFA helped illegally displace thousands of veteran black educators-most from the communities where they teach.” Go to the article to see the links.

“TFA exacerbates inequalities for students of color. TFA novices begin their meager two years with less than 20 hours of practice in front of children, even for students with special needs. Regardless of the racial/socio-economic background of their novices, TFA is offering our neediest kids uncertified, underprepared, short-term novices in lieu of professional educators.”

TFA itself has an “elitist, white, middle-class normative culture.”

“TFA practices disaster capitalism which is devastating communities of color. Teach For America is supported and funded by the very forces which caused the financial crisis throwing many families of color into foreclosure, bankruptcy, even homelessness, which refuse to pay workers fair wages thereby growing poverty, and are increasing inequality today. When your largest funders are companies like Walmart, Bank of America, and Goldman Sachs, you do not get to pretend to speak for the oppressed and disenfranchised.”

She adds:

“On a personal note, I recently returned to the Chicago Public Schools and now teach in a school on Chicago’s southside where over 90% of the teachers are African American women. These veteran black educators have gone through the chaos of school closings, many grew up in and still live in the community offering a wealth of knowlege, and are some of the most amazing teachers I have ever met. We also have one TFA teacher. While a lovely young lady and a person of color, she comes from out of state, is new to Chicago, is not trained for the special education position she was placed in, and is there because the last TFAer left after his two years were up. This is not a solution.”