Collected on this page is the building-level employee retention data for each RPS school, broken down by race, for the school years [SY] 2018-2018 to 2022-2023. This data was pulled from a 2023 FOIA for the purposes of tracking worker retention patterns across the district at the building level.
While line graphs can be very helpful for identifying trends, in cases where workers are employed in small numbers that data can look confusing. The sample data given below (below, left) follows predictable patterns for white and Black workers, but is harder to track for Asian-American and Latinx workers, who number only in the single digits. On the right, you can see a diagram illustrating how to read a line graph of worker retention when workers of a specific identity are the sole workers of that group in a single building. In the case of this building, there have been two Asian-American workers in the past 5 years, one of whom was hired in the 18/19 school year and left the next year, the second of whom joined the building in the 21/22 school year and remains employed. One Latinx worker was hired in 18/19; they left in 22/23.
Because tracking retention in percentages makes it impossible to discern the proportion of workers by group, we have included below the total number of individuals in all RPS buildings and the total number of individuals by racial and ethnic group district wide. Black workers make up the largest portion of RPS employees; they are also the employee group that is leaving the district the fastest. While Latinx and Asian-American workers are the only groups with a growing retention rate, they are also the smallest group of workers in the district.
Finally, it’s worth noting the language here is complicated for the 2020-2021 School Year. The language denotes workers “in buildings” when the more accurate language would be “assigned by building” as our district operated fully virtually for the full school year. We were the only district in the state to do so, making RPS a highly competitive employer in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. For this reason, we see retention increases across the board for that year; followed by a drastic drop off in the years following. The full data of that drop is astounding: River City Middle School lost 32 Black workers in the 21-22 school year alone, and 36 Black workers in the single year following. You can browse the full data here.
