Minority Teacher Candidates in Massachusetts Failing State Licensing Exam

Last Sunday the Boston Globe featured a very troubling story regarding minority teacher candidates in the state of Massachusetts. According to the paper, since the start of the test nearly a decade ago, 52 percent of Hispanics and 54 percent of blacks failed the writing portion of the state licensing exam.

At issue is a troubling comparison statistic. It seems that just 23 percent of white applicants fail the exam. In addition, according to the Globe, Blacks and Hispanics score lower than whites in other test subjects like English, history and math.

The result is a state with far fewer minority teacher candidates than is desired. The significant number of failures by minorities leads to several key questions that must be thoroughly studied.

Problems with the Tests? or the Applicants?
Are the tests creating barriers so that quality teachers candidates are being pushed aside? Or are the candidates that fail so lacking in the basic writing abilities that any teacher would need to be able to successfully teach students?

Another thought that is being bandied about is the notion that the tests are culturally biased. This concept has led a Cambridge lawyer to plan to file a class action lawsuit against the state’s Department of Education.

Problems with Teacher Preparation Programs?
A more pertinent question revolves around the quality of education that these minority applicants received at their respective college or university - were these applicants truly prepared for the profession and the subsequent certification exam? Instead of suing the state, one would think it were time to hold the teacher training programs that each of these applicants attended accountable for their failure to properly prepare their students for the rigor of the exam.

We doubt that those schools would consider returning the tuition dollars that were charged. We also doubt that any such thing as legal efforts charging educational malpractice would stand either.

But any schools that graduated these candidates should at a minimum provide additional tuition-free courses as well as test preparation seminars for each student until that graduate passes the state licensure exam. Politicians in Massachusetts should demand that college teacher preparation programs be held accountable for this troubling trend.