Walter Sherrill made chemistry cool. He was the sort of refined man who seemed to glide across a room. His voice never rose above a quiet tone, and he wore a mostly stern expression on a peaceful countenance as he explained scientific equations. I cherished the rare times he smiled—or on occasion—chuckled at the ludicrous conclusions of his high school students.
I would marry Mr. Sherrill, I secretly decided, or someone like him—someone who could inspire me to stay up late exacting caffeine crystals from a cup of coffee using various filtering methods. Someone who would inspire me to achieve my greatest.
Sure, I had male family members who were inspiring. My dad was an elementary school teacher, and he helped me win a gold ribbon in the second-grade science fair. There were uncles and cousins who also made wonderful contributions to my life.
But there was something about Mr. Sherrill. He would not stand for mediocre work, and he challenged all his students. Day in, day out, he wore a white lab coat over his freshly-starched shirts and perfectly creased dress pants. He always wore a tie. Mr. Sherrill was a black man and a teacher, like my dad. They were both in a very small minority. That’s still the case today. Of the country’s 3 million teachers, fewer than 2 percent are African-American men.
TEACH, a federal recruiting program, was launched last fall to make the nation’s pool of teachers more diverse. It’s crucially important for African-American boys to have black male teachers. But all students benefit from seeing a variety of cultures, backgrounds and skin tones in the classroom. Education Secretary Arne Duncan has been touring and making pleas to people of color—especially men—to consider teaching as a career. One goal is to boost the number of black men in the teaching corps to 5 percent by 2015. Despite school district budget gaps, urban districts have both tremendous needs and job openings.
“There are few experiences that surpass the feeling I get when I see the ‘lights go on’ in the eyes of my students,” said Tony Abercrombie, a black man who has taught for a dozen years at middle and high schools in New York City. He decided to teach after a decade-long career as a professional photographer, where he routinely worked with celebrities. “The sense of a good job well done that I feel at the end of a great day in the classroom is something I really like about teaching.”
For many, finding a career is an evolution. Becoming a teacher, while seen as a noble profession, may take some time—and even a couple other careers. Being a proficient math student may not translate immediately into a career of teaching math. It could mean first becoming an engineer, a system’s analyst or accountant.
But in time these black men can find their way to classrooms. And they can “present a new narrative in how students see black males,” said Calvin Briggs, who became a high school math teacher in Birmingham, Ala., after a career in computer-aided design. Briggs brought his empathy, his corporate world savvy and his dress code of wing-tipped shoes, French cuffed shirts and bow ties to the classroom. And in a turnaround, students started wearing a teen version of the un-tied bow. More importantly, they started making plans for their professional futures.
I never knew what drew Mr. Sherrill to teaching or if he had another career beforehand. And I wasn’t positive if Mr. Sherrill was directly responsible for the elevated science and math scores on my college board exams, but he sure was a big part of the reason. I would love for all students to meet a Mr. Sherrill, a Mr. Abercrombie or a Mr. Briggs in their classrooms. The positive effects would last a lifetime.
Do you have any ideas for encouraging black men to get into the teaching profession, especially at the elementary school level?
Williamson is associate editor of Teaching Tolerance.
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