A growing and significant body of research suggests that students benefit from having a teacher of the same race or ethnicity. Yet .
St. Louis entrepreneur Angelica Harris knows the effects of diversity in education firsthand. It wasn鈥檛 until she attended college at Washington University that she had her first Black teacher.
鈥淗e became a mentor to me,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 felt that if he can do it, I can do it.鈥�
Harris founded in 2022 to pair Black students with tutors who look like them, have similar socioeconomic backgrounds, similar upbringings or similar interests.
鈥淚t's so important for students to have instructors who relate to them,鈥� Harris said. 鈥淚t's a confidence builder, especially for young people, when they have role models in their lives.鈥�
Black students who had two or more Black teachers are , according to National Bureau of Economic Research data. Harris said students are also more likely to have higher school attendance rates and receive scholarships when they learn from teachers of similar backgrounds.
Top Tutors for Us reports that the share of students who scored more than 20 on the ACT .
鈥淲hen we see students get into their dream colleges or receive scholarship money 鈥� that just fills my heart,鈥� Harris said.
Most of the 13 schools that Top Tutors for Us partners with are Title 1 schools, so more than 90% of the students they serve come from disadvantaged communities across the country.
鈥淎round 70% of our students are first-gen [college students]. That's a big reason why I founded [Top Tutors for Us],鈥� Harris said, 鈥渟o these students can have a more personalized, tailored touch.鈥�
Looking forward, Harris plans to establish partnerships with more schools, nonprofits and college-bound organizations. She also wants to utilize artificial intelligence.
鈥淭his is an AI world now, and so we see generative AI playing a factor in our lesson building for students [and] our cultural competency matching.鈥�
To learn more about Angelica Harris鈥� story and the effects of cultural competency in education, listen to St. Louis on the Air on , , or , or click the play button below.
鈥�鈥� brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by , , , and . Jada Jones is our production assistant. The audio engineer is .
