While working on this teacher diversity series, we visited one of the schools in the city with an all-white faculty, A.S. Jenks in South Philadelphia. What we found was a school that in many ways is a model of diversity. Its principal is black, and the student body comes from all over the world. Its teachers, nearly all of them native white South Philadelphians, celebrate the new cultures their students bring to the school.

Principal Siouda Douglas thinks it absolutely important to have diversity among teachers, although she has nothing but praise for her current staff. She would like to have more teachers of color, but few apply, she said. She once thought she had an African American who was interested, only to discover the applicant had meant to apply to J.S. Jenks in Chestnut Hill.