Los Angeles Teacher Layoff Plans

Jennifer Medina
"Teacher Layoff Plans in Los Angeles Pose Broad Implications"
THE NEW YORK TIMES
MARCH 4, 2011
URL: WWW.NYTIMES.COM/2011/03/05/US/05LAYOFFS.HTML?REF=EDUCATION
TOPIC: THE HEIGHTENED CONFLICT BETWEEN TEACHER LEAYOFFS, SENIORITY, BUDGET DEFICITS, AND TEACHERS’ UNIONS.

SUMMARY: In Los Angeles a court ruling ratified a settlement agreed to by plaintiffs and the school district, is being appealed by the teachers’ union.
Last spring, the American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights groups sued the school district on behalf of parents, saying that their children’s right to an education, guaranteed in the State Constitution, would be violated by the layoffs. Like most districts in the country, Los Angeles has long had an agreement with the union that layoffs are based primarily on seniority. Lawyers for the parents argued that the layoffs would disproportionately affect poor, black and Latino students, who are more likely to attend schools that are difficult to staff and have a high proportion of inexperienced teachers.
If the ruling is upheld for the seemingly inevitable layoffs this summer, Los Angeles, the second-largest district in the country, will be among the first to dismiss teachers using criteria other than seniority.

INTENDED AUDIENCE: GENERAL PUBLIC

KEY POINTS: In essence, the ruling put the rights of students above job protections.
RELEVANCE: As new teachers, we would benefit from being protected from layoffs based on seniority alone. On the other hand, with 30,000 teachers facing layoffs in California alone, will there be any jobs for us to apply?

Court Upholds Federal Teacher-Protection Law

"Court Upholds Federal Teacher-Protection Law" by Mark Walsh

Education Week

Published Online on February 10, 2011

Complete Url:  http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/school_law/2011/02/court_upholds_federal_teacher-.html

This article was written in Education Week so is intended for the Education Community, but I think it is applicable to all of society as it answers the question about if a school can be held liable for the safety of its students.  Here is the basic summary from the article:  "A federal statute meant to give teachers and school administrators protection from legal liability over their efforts to maintain safe and orderly schools has been upheld against a constitutional challenge. The Missouri Supreme Court, ruling in a lawsuit in which a student who had been slashed by another student sought to hold a school superintendent liable, held that the federal law was a valid exercise of Congress' powers under the spending clause in Article I of the Constitution."

For teachers and administrators, upholding the Paul D. Coverdale Teacher Protection Act is good to know you will not be held liable if a student injures another student.  The ruling also upholds the premise that a person (the attacking student) is liable for his own actions and the blame cannot be shifted to the teacher even if the student had attacked others in the past, had previously had brought a knife to school and the school was not made aware of his history.

On the other hand, it would seem to make sense to let a the student's new school know he has had a violent past.  Since the new school will contact the old one to obtain the student's record, this seems to be a matter of common sense to include the student's history.  Add to the fact the student was in Special Education and had an IEP and nothing of his violence was recorded in the IEP seems almost negligent to me.  My son has Asperger's Syndrome and in Minnesota and here in Oregon almost everything about his behavior was recorded including times when he flashed anger when he was frustrated at school.

For us as future teachers and possibly administrators this article brings up points that are extremely relevant as we probably all encounter a situation as described above.  It is good to know we will be protected and students are responsible for their own actions.  However, I believe the previous school should have included the times of violence in the IEP and was negligent in not doing so.  Thoughts?