Perspectives on color in teacher education programs: Prominent issues

Race continues to be a critical, complex, and pervasive issue in America. Teacher educa-tion is not immune to its influence. Schools, colleges, and departments of education (SCDEs) are under increasing attack for failure to address issues of racial diversity (Parker & Hood, 1995). Criticisms have ranged from failure of programs to recruit and retain graduate students of color to courses in the teacher preparation curriculum largely devoid of content and knowledge about various racial groups in the United States (Holmes Group Forum, 1990). The Holmes Partnership and other reform initiatives (e.g., Project 30) have recognized the need to recruit university faculty and students of color as essen-tial to achieving cultural diversity and developing more viable programs. Although Holmes ac-knowledges that several schools and universities have recruited and retained minorities, one Holmes position paper states these [steps] may not be sufficient as the current situation calls for radical action by universities, colleges of education, school systems, and Professional Development Schools (Holmes Group, 1990, p. 40). The presence and contributions of mi-norities in higher education have foci of interest for many researchers (Darling-Hammond, 1996