Posted on 02/25/2011 3:06:33 AM PST by Scanian
The United Federation of Teachers maintains that laying off teachers according to seniority is the only "fair" way to accommodate New York City budget cuts.
Fair for whom?
It's certainly not fair to students, who lose the opportunity to learn from great young teachers. And seniority-based layoffs are particularly detrimental in New York City, which has invested heavily in recent years in hiring a corps of highly able young teachers.
But the simple fact is that "Last in, first out" is just about the worst of all of the bad alternatives for reducing the teaching staff.
No one honestly believes that releasing the most junior teachers is equivalent to removing the least effective teachers -- not teachers, not union leaders. And certainly not the thinking man on the street: The new Quinnipiac Poll shows that New Yorkers favor ending the LIFO rule by 85 to 12 percent.
"Last in, first out" is just a bureaucratic rule imposed in the name of "fairness" -- meaning only that it avoids the use of discretion, which, of course, can be imperfectly administered.
Here's an idea for a fair layoff system: Put every city teacher's name in a hat, and blindly pick them out.
Sound crazy? From the perspective of student achievement, it would actually be preferable to seniority-based layoffs.
Research shows that the average teacher improves in each of the first three to five years in the classroom. Proponents of LIFO point to these findings as clear evidence that if we must remove teachers, the youngest ones should go. But this is sleight of hand.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
How about keeping the best people and getting rid of the dead weight? Doesn’t fit a lib’s idea of ‘fairness’ but it sure does mine.
HMMMMMM. Makes you wonder if the Post would take this attitude if they were laying off Post employee’s.
Getting out the Senior people would certainly be the best for the city , since it could mean that someone just short of retirement could be laid off and cheated out of their pension.
Laying people off according to their ability would be great, but who gets to judge that ability.
Certainly the best way would be to judge the competence or incompetence of those being laid off, anyone want to take any bets on how that would work out?
Start by cutting the sports budgets
He has a failure rate of 40%.
On the whole, this is a rather confused commentary.
Teachers voluntarily leave at both ends of their careers. What is the average attrition rate among new teachers, both for those whose contracts are not renewed and for those who wish to voluntarily leave the field? How many teachers retire each year? Die or become incompacitated? Would choosing to not fill those positions with new hires close the budget shortfall? If not, how many positions would still need to be trimmed?
Baltimore City’s Education Superintendent is offering buyouts to senior teachers as a way of avoiding laying off the fresh new ones. That makes the culling voluntary, and apparently reduces the total payroll significantly.
Short of rape, (statutory or "rape, rape") how many teachers do you know who have been dismissed? Me neither. Have you ever wondered why a union member subjected to sexual harassment NEVER applies to the Union for protection from, and discipline of, the offending union member?
Yes that works well , and it is voluntary, but at some point, when it stops working there have to be hard decisions made.
Federal law precludes this.
Pensions are vested by law, (Not contract) I'm not sure of the period but believe it's after 7 years and cannot be "lost" by simple layoff. Bankruptcy would do the trick though.
IIRC, when the law was passed vesting would occure after 5, 10 or 15 years dependent on some other criteria I just don't remember. At the time I worked for the Bell System and we already had 15 year vesting.
If any employee has a history of poor performance appraisals they should be at the front of the layoff line no matter the duration of employment.
I agree. Sports should be an after school activity as it is in other countries....
No one ever mentions the real issue. The amount of total salary paid to non-teachers in most school districts far outstrips the teachers’ salaries total. The budget can easily be reduced without affecting one single teacher. Fire the parasites.
I had teachers like that when I was growing up.
Here is a perfect argument about why we need to support the teacher’s unions... can’t argue with this logic!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kxc6kzH-uI
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