Roxbury Prep is Focused on Solving Boston’s Teacher Shortage

BOSTON – As students head back to the classroom, massive numbers of teachers are suffering from burnout and schools are struggling to fill gaps.

Simultaneously, the learning and equity gaps that existed before the COVID-19 pandemic for students of color and those from economically disadvantaged homes have widened.

In a study released earlier this month by the National Center for Education Statistics, Black student test scores in math declined 13 points, compared to five points among their white peers.

One local school, Roxbury Prep, is working to help solve the teacher shortage in the city in an unconventional way – by finding young candidates before they’ve even graduated college.

Roxbury Prep is a public charter school that currently serves about 1,600 Boston students across five campuses. Roxbury Prep’s mission is to prepare students from historically underserved communities to graduate from college, find success in careers, and achieve their dreams.

This summer, rising college seniors from across the country came to Roxbury Prep for a five-week fellowship that offered hands-on classroom and instructional experience. Similar to previous years’ cohorts, most of them headed back to their final year in college with a job offer in hand to come back and teach at Roxbury Prep when they graduate in May 2023. This program has become Roxbury Prep’s biggest and most successful new-teacher pipeline.

“More than 70% of the Roxbury Prep teaching fellows are young people of color, and we are thrilled with the pipeline we are building and talented future teachers we are helping to mold,” said Shradha Patel, Founder of Roxbury Prep High School.

“Over 50% of our teachers identify as people of color, four times the Massachusetts average and more than double the national average," Patel said. "This fellowship reflects our school’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, better serves our students, and has increased learning outcomes for students across the board.”

This year was particularly special as three of Roxbury Prep’s alumni came back as Teaching Fellows with the goal of securing a full-time position in the place that gave them their high-school education.

This program, which has been used for years, comes at a time when the teacher shortage in Massachusetts is more prevalent than ever, with one recent analysis reporting 14% of early career teachers quit their teaching positions 18 months into the COVID-19 pandemic.

While Massachusetts legislators debate the Educator Diversity Act, Roxbury Prep is hard at work addressing this issue and bringing solutions to the community.