Tony Overman/The Olympian
River Ridge High School teacher Tonja Phillips (center) offers a hug to student Davilee Jones as they cross paths in the hallway between classes Wednesday afternoon. At right is student Latoya Allen.

North Thurston seeks more minority teachers

Affirmative action plan doesn't mean quotas, district officials say

ALMA D. SHARPE, THE OLYMPIAN

LACEY -- Teacher Tonja Phillips says that being black hasn't made her a target of discrimination at River Ridge High School.

But her ethnic background does make her more approachable in the eyes of some students, especially students of color, Phillips said.

"I notice that they will say things to me that they don't feel comfortable saying to other people," Phillips said. "Things about their own personal beliefs, their place in society and how they're doing overall."

Phillips' role at River Ridge is one of the reasons behind a renewed push for hiring minority teachers and staffers at North Thurston Public Schools.

District officials are now circulating a draft of an affirmative action plan that they say will help them increase the number of minority staffers and teachers in the district.

About 30 percent of North Thurston's student body is nonwhite. The district staff, from principals to maintenance workers, is 10 percent minority.

The plan does not call for specific quotas, and officials said they won't hire people simply because they are minorities. Rather, better and more targeted recruitment will lead them to expand the pool of qualified applicants to include under-represented groups, they said.

"We've said to our (principals) that our staff should look like our students; however they haven't had the pool of applicants from which to draw," said Lori Tompkins, the district's employment relations administrator.

The plan, which is being reviewed by the district's own multicultural advisory committee and some community groups, includes labor market statistics that show the district is not employing as many minorities and women as it could.

Targeted recruiting

This will be the first time in many years that North Thurston will be able to do targeted recruiting and hiring.

Last year, the district pulled away from the personnel cooperative it belonged to as part of Educational Service District 113. The cooperative processes job applications for most districts in Thurston County and was unable to do any targeted recruiting for specific districts.

North Thurston, the largest and most diverse district in the region, needed extra help, said Stephen Bernath, a parent and a member of the district's multicultural committee.

"It gives North Thurston an opportunity to be clear about who they are and what kind of identity they have when they're doing hiring," Bernath said. "A lot of the other districts served by the cooperative are small and rural districts."

Among the district's primary goals is to get the word out among prospective teachers that North Thurston Public Schools welcomes and values a diverse staff, and has good schools located in a livable, affordable place, Tompkins said.

"It's really important that we tell people who we are," Tompkins said. "Some people think North Thurston is near Kitsap County."

That means having a bigger presence in state and regional education job fairs, which the district has already done since it left the cooperative.

Officials also will speak to local minority associations and women's groups about the district and the job opportunities in it.

Creating partnerships

At the same time, administrators are making contacts with officials of historically black colleges to create a partnership that involves college graduates coming to North Thurston as student teachers and possibly staying in the area for work.

It's an approach that Larry Jenkins, a member of the multicultural committee and a veteran district bus driver, supports.

Jenkins is also a member of the Thurston Group of Washington State, which is conducting college recruitment fairs for minority students this month.

The Thurston Group has invited representatives of historically black colleges to speak to students at several events throughout the Puget Sound region.

Minority students can benefit from being around minority teachers and other professionals, Jenkins said.

"These students need role models," he said.

Rachel Kramer, an 18-year-old North Thurston High School student and member of the multicultural committee, said she's supportive of having diverse student teachers, but she doesn't want to see the affirmative action plan turn into a tool for reverse discrimination.

"I strongly believe that the best way to make people equal is to treat them equally," Kramer said. "Giving groups advantages over other groups is racially and gender discriminatory."

She said she prefers the district's tactic of helping minority students learn about college opportunities.

"I think it's better to help people become qualified for the jobs than giving them an advantage in hiring," she said.

Administrators and other committee members say they're not interested in hiring unqualified teachers. Instead, they say they want to attract qualified candidates who haven't applied for district jobs in the past.

Atsuchi Kiuchi, a Japanese American on the multicultural committee, sees benefit in every effort that goes toward increasing diversity among educators and other school staff.

Kiuchi moved his family into the North Thurston district boundary 30 years ago because it held the highest ratio of minority students in the region.

He said he wanted his daughters, who are half Japanese and half Caucasian, to be exposed to people of various cultures.

The plan, while not an end-all solution, is a step in the right direction, he said.

"We're expecting some progress, some improvement -- maybe not overnight," Kiuchi said. "But we're moving in the right direction."

Alma D. Sharpe covers education for The Olympian. She can be reached at 360-754-4226.

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