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 Roy I. Jones inspires black men to enter teaching profession
By Holly Fisher, Special Projects Editor
A few years ago, fewer than 200 black men were teaching in South Carolina’s elementary schools, a small percentage of the more than 20,000 elementary teachers around the state.
Roy I. Jones is trying to improve those numbers. As director of the Call Me MISTER program at Clemson University, Jones is working with black men interested in careers in elementary education.
Since the program’s launch in 2000, 25 MISTER scholars have graduated and are teaching around the state. Another 150 are enrolled in the program. Initially, Clemson partnered with four historically black colleges in South Carolina: Benedict College, Claflin University, Morris College and South Carolina State University. The program has since expanded to five two-year colleges as well as the College of Charleston.
MISTER participants are enrolled in their respective partner colleges and then receive additional support and tuition assistance through the MISTER program. In exchange for every year of tuition assistance, recipients must commit to teaching a year in South Carolina. Over the last year, Jones said the program received 20,000 inquiries nationwide for 50 available spots.
Other states are looking to form their own Call Me MISTER programs, including Virginia, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Georgia, Florida, North Carolina and Kentucky.
The program has received plenty of attention from USA Today, National Public Radio, Southern Living magazine and as part of Oprah’s Angel Network.
“I would have been the last to tell you (the program) would have gotten that kind of exposure so quickly,” Jones said. “But it told me the crisis of this situation is beyond South Carolina, it goes beyond the borders of our state and is a national issue.”
The number of male teachers overall is at a 40-year low, Jones said, in part because of low teacher pay, the diminishing image of schools and teachers and the fact teaching has historically been seen as a woman’s profession.
The threat of school violence and added responsibilities for teachers have also made teaching an unattractive career choice, Jones said.
“At the elementary level, men have not been (teaching) in great numbers,” he said. “The contrast to that is the most suspended, expelled and dropouts are males, specifically black males.”
While Jones recognizes the Call Me MISTER program isn’t the overall solution, he thinks the program is “making a significant impact on some of this dismal data.”
A career educator for more than 20 years, Jones left his job at Claflin College to direct Call Me MISTER at Clemson.
“I don’t think anything I’ve been a part of has inspired the imagination and enthusiasm and given as much inspiration and hope as Call Me MISTER,” Jones said. “There’s something about it, something about men who have dedicated their lives to being teachers at the elementary level. It’s just something people don’t see every day.”
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