The Mental Health Struggle of America’s Black Teachers
The pandemic and racism create a stressful back-to-school time
With Covid-19 cases in Illinois on the rise, Glenbard Township High School District plans to continue remote instruction, which began on August 17, at least through mid-October. But as the weeks go by, Black teachers in the district are facing increasing anxiety about navigating in-person education in a pandemic.
Teresa Lawrence, EdD, 54, teaches English to grades 9–12 at Glenbard East High School. As an African American woman, Lawrence says she is conscious that “for many of my students, [I will] be the first Black teacher they ever have.” While in-person instruction would be ideal for her interaction with students, she fears it because of her underlying conditions.
Lawrence has diabetes and sickle cell anemia, and her husband, who is almost 60, has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which puts them both in at-risk groups for severe forms of Covid-19. Lawrence is not financially ready to retire, so she can’t avoid in-person instruction. “I trust in God, and I pray to try and assuage those fears as best I can,” she says. “My faith is a big part of who I am, and that’s what I use to sustain me.”
The racial justice protests also weigh heavily on her mind. The rhetoric used in the cases of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Jacob Blake, and numerous other victims of public brutality has incited “a level of frustration and anxiety” in Lawrence that she says wasn’t there before, and it makes her daily life, including teaching, harder.
She is one of many Black teachers, who like their Black students, are dealing with the disproportionate impacts of the coronavirus pandemic and videos of police brutality across the country — making this school year an especially difficult one to navigate. Teachers like Lawrence are devoting their energy to their students’ needs while also dealing with their own underlying conditions and racist systems that make them especially at risk…
