Bio: Constance Lindsay earned a doctorate in human development and social policy from Northwestern University, where she was an Institute of Education Sciences’ predoctoral fellow. Since leaving Northwestern, Lindsay has worked in education policy in various contexts, applying her research training in traditional studies and in creating and evaluating new systems and policies regarding teachers. Lindsay’s areas of expertise include teacher quality and diversity, analyzing and closing racial achievement gaps, and adolescent development. Her work has been published in such journals as Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis and Social Science Research. Lindsay received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Duke University and master’s degree in public policy from Georgetown University. Before doctoral study at Northwestern, she was a Presidential Management Fellow at the US Department of Education. Constance Lindsay’s research focuses on policies and practices to close racial achievement gaps in education. Currently, her main focus is on teacher diversity and how to obtain a high quality, diverse educator workforce.

Topic: How Teachers Learn Racial Competency: Through Peers and in Context

Abstract: The US teaching force remains disproportionately white while the student body grows more diverse. It is therefore important to understand how and under what conditions white teachers learn racial competency. This study applies a mixed-methods approach investigate the hypothesis that Black peers improve white teachers’ effectiveness when teaching Black students. The quantitative portion of this study relies on longitudinal data from North Carolina to show that having a Black same-grade peer significantly improves the achievement and reduces the suspension rates of white teachers’ Black students. These effects are persistent over time and largest for novice teachers, which suggests that the mechanism at play is peer learning. Qualitative evidence from open-ended interviews of North Carolina public school teachers reaffirms these findings, and uncovers sources of learning for teachers and contextual factors that moderate these findings.