Bristol helped conceive some of those programs after studying the experiences of male teachers of color.

“There was nothing in their professional development that helped them understand and make sense of these unique challenges that they believed were a result of their race and gender,” he says.

Now, at Godinez’s school in Compton, Bristol is experimenting with something a little different. Here, school leadership is working directly alongside those teachers.

“It's not enough to just focus on the men of color. You have to focus on the organization that they're in,” Bristol says. “If you're going to support teachers, you have to recreate and reimagine the condition of the school they're in, and the person who leads that is the principal.”

Among teachers of color who cited job dissatisfaction as a reason for leaving the profession, over 80% named frustration with administrators as the source of their discontent, according to the LPI study.

‘Like an AA Class for Teachers’

On a Saturday at Dominguez High School in Compton, a dozen teachers are gathered in the library, along with the principal, assistant principal and district superintendent.

“Good morning, good morning!” Principal Blain Watson greets them. “Welcome back to our Compton Male Teachers of Color Network meeting.”

The teachers recently paired up and visited each other's classrooms and begin to discuss some of the strategies they discovered.

“What I noticed in Mr. Ojini’s class — he was saying don’t worry about the mistakes, it’s OK to make mistakes,” Dominguez High School math teacher Chung Mo Kim tells the group. He explains his own tendency to criticize repeated mistakes. “I think I kind of put the kids a little more on the defensive. I need to empathize with the students more.”

Other teachers mention tech tools they discovered or new educational materials. They consider the value of class time spent getting to know students personally, and how shaking each student’s hand at the door can build rapport.

Eric Wells, a history teacher also from Dominguez High, says that learning from fellow teachers in a nonjudgmental space gives him inspiration and makes him feel less isolated. “A lot of times in a classroom you can feel like I'm the only one dealing with this,” he says. “So to hear other people have gone through it, it's almost like an AA class for teachers.”

These meetings are as much a source of camaraderie and nourishment as a place to develop and share expertise. So on this Saturday, the group turns to talking about a campus lockdown that happened a day earlier when a student made a violent threat. Bristol asks the teachers how they’re feeling about it.

“Our kids don't know how to react to that trauma because they're kids,” Godinez says. “It's like we have to model that.”

But what really frustrates him is how parents can thwart those efforts. “Sometimes you call a parent because the child's been in a fight, and the parent’s coming down here to get into a fight with someone, you know, and escalate it.”

“We're here for the kids,” Godinez adds. “But it's like the whole community needs the help.”

‘He Needs Help Just Like We Do’

As the teachers talk, Principal Watson listens intently. “I've literally woken up in the middle of the night thinking about kids here at school, like are they OK?,” he says. “We’re talking about self care — I don't know how to care for myself when I'm waking up thinking about someone else's children, right? I don’t know how to deal with that.”

This is a place where even the principal doesn’t have to have things figured out. Dominguez High special education teacher Damon Stokes says seeing Watson show such vulnerability helps humanizes him. “I was like, ‘wow.’ I thought he had it all together. He needs help just like we do,” he says.

The experience, Stokes says, has changed how he relates to Watson. “Before I just thought he was this hard principal,” he says, noting that he used to take it personally when Watson seemed upset. “Now, when I look in his face I can see he’s in distress, or something’s bothering him.”