L.A. schools chief targets poor-performing teachers

[tonysam]

In what he described as a “sweeping new policy,” Supt. Ramon C. Cortines today announced that the Los Angeles Unified School District would begin aggressively weeding out poor-performing teachers and administrators.

“This district can rightly be criticized for the promotion of ineffective teachers over the years,” he said in a prepared statement. “That is about to change. We do not owe poor performers a job.”

The policy encourages district supervisors to consider firing some of the 404 probationary teachers who were found to need improvement in their last performance evaluation.

It also urges greater scrutiny of 339 administrators who have not become permanent in their positions and 175 tenured teachers who received negative evaluations last year.

The policy was announced days after The Times presented the district with the conclusions of a forthcoming investigation, which will be published Sunday.



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Fuck union contracts and due process. The war on teachers has just begun.

[goclark]

1. I live here and the Teachers and Students are in big trouble

The Supt. is all the way in the pocket of the Charters and they are Union Busting as fast as they can.

My cousin teaches (25 years plus) and they just got notices that they would all be taking a 12% cut.

Our "Mayor" has all but 1 vote on HIS Board and he is making all the schools Charters as fast as he can, with the help of his "good buddy" mentioned above ~ :puke:

[montanto]

13. FYI we are not taking a 12% cut.

If your cousin is an LAUSD teacher, s/he need not fear a 12% cut at this time. The 12% cut was proposed to the house and it was quickly shot down. The alternative is what Cortinez is doing now. Getting ready to fire the easiest targets to cut the budget (and increase class sizes).

[goclark]

14. Thanks for the update

I wish the staff and students the best.

[la la]

2. this is just

total bullshit.

the district didn't evaluate the teachers 'correctly'---so now---'we do not owe poor performers a job'

bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

[paulsby]

3. probationary employees

generally don't get union protection fwiw, generally speaking. it's true in my career as well.

they don't need due process to fire a probationary cop. once the cop gets off probation, it's an entirely different story.

i would assume the same applies to teachers on their probationary period.

[tonysam]

4. It also mentions tenured teachers as well.

A principal can trash any old teacher and get away with it. Due process hearings are jokes, as anybody who has gone through it can tell you.

[paulsby]

7. well, that's messed up

i think the probationary period system works well for public employees, but once probation is over, due process should apply.

i realize here that many people think cops should be fired on the spot whenever some criminal makes some sort of claim of abuse, etc. but we deserve (and generally get) due process.

The same SHOULD apply to teachers, of course.

i know that SOME school districts give way TOO much protection to tenured teachers. NYC comes to mind. the new yorker (hardly a right wing rag) did a great story on how ridiculous their system is, where teachers could basically survive and get paid for years after gross misconduct. iow, it varies in different locations, which is what you'd expect.

[tonysam]

8. I have a post in this folder refuting the nonsense in the New Yorker

Stephen Brill doesn't know squat what he is talking about.

NYC is ground zero in the destruction of public education.

[paulsby]

9. i'd like to see how it

"refutes" the new yorker article. ime regardless of whether you agree with their ideology, the new yorker has an excellent reputation for solid reporting. i'd argue it's much better than the NYT, for sure.

of course this is often true of periodicals that can (and do ) go more in depth into stories vs. just repeating what talking heads and uninformed sources say off the top of their head.

[tonysam]

10. It doesn't matter. Brill doesn't know what he is talking about.

Read the thread in the folder about Brill; it was a letter written by an attorney who KNOWS what she is talking about regarding "due process" hearings which are jokes in education.

Some of us who have been chewed up and spit out by this corrupt system know what we are talking about. Brill does not.

This is the blog post featuring the very lengthy letter:

Tweed and its RRs: filling in what Brill conveniently left out

[paulsby]

11. i'll check out the link

thanks

[tonysam]

12. There is a lot more to the process than Brill wants people to think

The vast majority of the hundreds of teachers in rubber rooms are NOT there for true misconduct (criminal acts, improper contact with children); they are there for BOGUS reasons to get teachers to quit or retire. The system is being abused to save money on salaries and retirement.

A similar situation happened with me, and I am hoping for legal redress against the crooks at Washoe County School District.

[la la]

5. from the article:

*The policy was announced days after The Times presented the district with the conclusions of a forthcoming investigation, which will be published Sunday.

The investigation found that the district has often failed to meaningfully evaluate new teachers before granting them tenure, a status that makes them all but impossible to fire for performance reasons alone. *

*
It also urges greater scrutiny of 339 administrators who have not become permanent in their positions and 175 tenured teachers who received negative evaluations last year. *

it is true about probationary teachers having 'no rights'--but when evaluations are screwed up--no one is safe---excellent teacher or not.

[tonysam]

6. The LA Times is stridently anti-teacher

Anyone who has been a public school teacher and has been through a wrongful termination knows this "tenure" shit of it being "all but impossible to fire for performance reasons alone" is fucking bullshit.

I was fucking fired--illegally, as spelled out in the union contract regarding absences covered by FMLA--because I sent my form in before I had fully recovered from my illness and this fucking principal didn't allow me to amend the forms to cover the dates. This POS principal didn't even know what in the fuck she was doing, and those bastards in the district KNEW that and covered up for her. I have to find a lawyer to fucking SUE them.

So to these bastards in the media: Don't ever hand me the crap it is hard to get rid of teachers--it is EASY.

[LWolf]

15. How, exactly, does he intend to decide what constitutes

"poor" performance?

[tonysam]

16. Whatever and whoever the hell displeases a principal

or the principal is negligent in helping the teacher to "improve," especially teachers who have been there 30 or 35 years.

[LWolf]

17. What a nightmare. nt

[YvonneCa]

18. In my former district, the Supt. created the criteria...

...which I believe was heavy on test scores, age, and $$$ for benefits...and had a list of targeted teachers. Principals basically operated under an atmosphere of 'Us or Them'. They are at-will and had to do what they were told. This was told to me by union reps who did virtually NOTHING about any of it.

I was told by other administrators that I should sue. District personnel told me they were harassing 5-6 other teachers the year they targeted me.

[LWolf]

19. I sincerely hope that I can hang in until retirement.

It gets uglier all the time.

We need our unions to fight this. Hard.

[YvonneCa]

21. I hope you'll be able to do that. Hanging in...

...with that kind of stress is rough, but it can be done so long as there aren't health issues. NOTHING is more important than your health. :hug:

[LWolf]

24. Thank you. nt

[tonysam]

20. I am sure I was on a "shitlist" for H.R. after the previous

principal had written me up on a trumped-up charge for "violating" field trip protocol when he was retaliating for my refusing to cheat for him regarding alternative testing. I was supposed to be on some "plan of assistance," but the moron principal in the last school where I worked didn't even implement it. I suspect one tiny infraction, and I would be targeted by H.R., but the asshole there didn't know she hadn't done shit for me, had wrongfully fired me over an FMLA-covered absence, the form of which I wasn't allowed to revise to cover more days I had gotten sick after the acute sinus infection relapsed and the union contract specifically noted that any unauthorized absence--which in fact the absences were from the same illness--was grounds for RESIGNATION as abandonment of position--NOT firing, much less even knew anything of what the previous principal had done (which was a federal violation and grounds for a federal lawsuit, which of course the union naturally didn't tell me about and I wasn't aware I could have sued until after the statute of limitations had passed).

I was fired because of my age and the fact I had just received retirement vesting. It was all about money, not about the sick leave. I am currently looking for a lawyer, and the one I have just contacted I hope will take my case, which is pretty straightforward.

[YvonneCa]

22. "It was all about money,"...

...That was my conclusion, too. Sad, isn't it?

[tonysam]

23. It's never about the kids.

I loved the kids and hated the people in the central office who spearheaded an illegal termination.

[proud2BlibKansan]

25. There are 140 lawsuits against my school district

40 are by employees.

[tonysam]

26. Watch the lawsuits skyrocket if tenure is abolished

That's a purpose of tenure; to put the brakes on unscrupulous administrators who may be tempted to fire teachers they don't want around.