Learning from Counternarratives in Teach For America

Contents: Counternarratives and the Complexity of a Fuller Truth - Examining the «TFA Script» - Unexpected Life Changes Teaching in TFA: Counseling, Medical Prescriptions, Weight Changes, Increased Alcohol Consumption, Strained Relationships, Fatigue - The Reality of Trauma in TFA - TFA's Culture of Guilt and Shame - The Complex, Politicized Process of TFA and CM Identity Development - TFA Idealism and the Hero Teacher Narrative - Listening and Learning from Counternarratives: Moving From Idealism Towards Hope.

Sarah Matsui holds a BA in urban studies and a MSEd In secondary math education from the University of Pennsylvania. She taught middle school math and is an alumna of the 2011 Teach for America Greater Philadelphia Cohort.

«Sarah Matsui's book offers an unusually rich example of what practitioner knowledge and inquiry can contribute to critical conversations about educational equity and the toll that simplifications can take on teachers and, by extension, their students. Her intelligent and thoughtful narrative unpacks the complex interplay between TFA's persuasive discourse and the intense experiences of corps members as they grappled with profound gaps between expectations and their on-the-ground experiences as participants in the most highly touted reform of teacher education in recent history.
Conducted with great sensitivity to their self-described conflicts and trauma of participation, Matsui's analyses and interpretations of her extensive interviews are informed by her considerable knowledge and insights as an insider, as well as her use of compelling interpretive frameworks drawn from a number of disciplines. The book is timely and provocative, a must-read for anyone who cares deeply about teaching, teacher education, and quality education for urban communities.»
(Susan L. Lytle, Professor Emerita, University of Pennsylvania)

«Few elements of the education reform movement have been as polarizing as Teach For America. Critics of TFA have focused on its leadership, the inadequacy of the training, and the placement of recruits in mostly high-poverty minority schools, but Sarah Matsui's study opens a new and important window into why TFA deserves critical reconsideration. Matsui provides a detailed and revealing look at what it means to be a TFA recruit, including the pressures, challenges, and consequences for those recruits and the students they serve. This is a fair and complex work that contributes important nuance to how education reform is often misguided. Matsui's critical confrontation of TFA narratives and experiences calls for a re-imaging of what it means to become and be a teacher.»
(P.L. Thomas, Associate Professor of Education, Furman University)