PARTNERSHIP APPLAUDS HISTORIC DECISION TO PROTECT TEACHERS AT LOW PERFORMING SCHOOLS FROM UNFAIR LAYOFFS

Here's commentary from The Partnership for LA Schools:

 

PARTNERSHIP APPLAUDS HISTORIC DECISION TO

PROTECT TEACHERS AT LOW PERFORMING SCHOOLS FROM UNFAIR LAYOFFS

 

 

LOS ANGELES – The Partnership for Los Angeles Schools today endorsed the landmark decision by the Los Angeles School Board to protect students in the city's lowest performing schools from having their teachers laid off disproportionately to those at other schools. 

 

The Board's decision is a result of a lawsuit filed this past spring by the ACLU on behalf of the students at Markham, Gompers and Liechty Middle Schools—Markham and Gompers are Partnership schools.  Each of these schools had suffered grossly disproportionate teacher lay-offs as budget cuts forced reductions in the teacher workforce district-wide.   Markham and Gompers had seen teacher lay-offs of nearly 50% the prior year and were facing similar lay-offs this year until a Superior Court Judge issued a stay this past May preventing any layoffs at the 3 middle schools until the ACLU suit was resolved. 

 

The Board decision will now protect teachers from budget-based layoffs at not just Markham, Gompers and Liechty, but at the 25 schools with the highest teacher turnover in the district.  It will also protect up to 20 new schools and will make sure that no school in all of LAUSD is disproportionally impacted by layoffs.  

 

"Now, all the children in LA's most challenged schools have a guarantee the teachers they've grown to know and trust will be there more than a year.  These kids often have adults in and out of their lives all the time, so it is vital teachers provide consistency in order to build the trust necessary to create a solid learning environment.  This ruling assures that will now happen,  " said Marshall Tuck, CEO, Partnership for Los Angeles Schools.

 

The Partnership for Los Angeles Schools and Mayor Villaraigosa began the process of addressing the inequities of budget-based layoffs in the spring of 2009 when it first became apparent scheduled lay-offs would devastate the staffs at Gompers and Markham Middle Schools.  The Partnership and Mayor initially approached the school district seeking relief, but no solution was found.  Then the Partnership and Mayor asked the ACLU to get involved and after months of weekly meetings and research, the suit was filed in February of 2010.  On May 12 of that same year, Superior Court Judge William Highberger issued an injunction barring any further lay-offs at the three named schools until the suit was resolved.  That injunction stays in effect through June 2011.