Teach For America Selected For 2014 Latina Style 50 Report

Nonprofit Organization Recognized for Promoting Diversity and Providing Leadership Opportunities for Latinas

NEW YORK CITY, — LATINA Style Inc., the premier company addressing the needs of the Latina professional and business owner in the U.S., announced this week that Teach For America is among the 50 companies selected for its 2014 LATINA Style 50 Report.

Now in its 17th year, the LATINA Style 50 Report recognizes companies whose mission of diversity and inclusion is reflected in their employee recruiting, promotion, and professional-development efforts. For each annual report, more than 800 companies are reviewed based on their leadership programs, career opportunities, employee benefits, and Latina representation in senior positions.

Teach For America recruits, trains, and supports outstanding individuals of all backgrounds who commit to teach for two years in underserved schools and become lifelong leaders in the pursuit of educational equity. The organization, which is among the country’s largest providers of Latino teachers, has long recognized the potential of teachers who share students’ backgrounds to serve as critical classroom leaders and role models.

Over 80 percent of students at the more than 3,000 public schools partnering with Teach For America are Latino or African American, and more than 75 percent are eligible for the federal lunch program.  Nearly 50 percent of the organization’s 5,300 new corps members identify as people of color, including 13 percent who identify as Latino. One-third of these new teachers were the first in their families to attend college, and nearly 47 percent received Pell Grants.

“We are proud to have the most diverse corps in the history of Teach For America this year,” said Amanda Fernandez, vice president of Latino Community partnerships at Teach For America.  “Latino teachers, who bring impressive professional, academic and leadership experience, serve as critical classroom leaders and role models, and can have a meaningful impact on their students’ trajectories,” she added.

About Teach For America

Teach For America works in partnership with communities to expand educational opportunity for children facing the challenges of poverty. Founded in 1990, Teach For America recruits and develops a diverse corps of outstanding college graduates and professionals to make an initial two-year commitment to teach in high-need schools and become lifelong leaders in the movement to end educational inequity. This fall, 10,600 corps members will be teaching in 50 urban and rural regions across the country, while 37,000 alumni work from across sectors to ensure that all children have access to an excellent education. For more information, visit www.teachforamerica.org and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.