Teacher tenure reform headed for runway

by Jason Method
Saturday, February 4th, 2012
reprinted from DailyRecord.com.

TRENTON – Public school teachers would no longer enjoy tenure as lifetime job security and principals would have more power over personnel decisions under major legislation expected to be introduced today.

The bill would allow for currently tenured teachers to lose their job protections, expose ineffective teachers to layoffs and give greater latitude to school districts in firing.

State Sen. M. Teresa Ruiz, D-Essex, who heads the state Senate Education Committee, will sponsor the legislation. Gov. Chris Christie, who has now made education reform his top priority, has praised Ruiz for taking a “laboring role” in the tenure reform work.

The current tenure law, Ruiz said in an interview, comes from “a 100-year-old statute that morphed into something completely different than it was meant for.”

She added: “We recognize there has to be change.”

With the legislation, New Jersey will join about half of the states in the country that have reworked teacher tenure or are in process of doing so, one national expert said.

Although Christie has offered his proposals and previous bills had been submitted, the earlier versions were seen as opening volleys for debate.

The Ruiz bill would:

1. Require teachers to be classified in one of four categories after their annual evaluation: highly effective, effective, partially ineffective and ineffective.
2. Allow tenure to be revoked for teachers and assistant principals rated in the bottom two categories if they did not improve the following year.
3. Force teachers deemed fully or partially ineffective to face layoffs, even if they have seniority, a key element demanded by education reform advocates.

But school district needs would be the first criteria in determining whom to let go. The bill also affects other personnel areas.

For example, principals would have final say over whether a teacher is hired for or transferred to their school.

Tenured teachers who are fired for cause would face an expedited appeal timeline, with the final determination to be made by an administrative law judge.

Teachers rated in the top two categories who are laid off or not assigned to a school would receive one year’s pay and benefits while they await an opening in a hiring pool.

It would take no less than four years for new teachers to gain tenure under the proposed system. In the first year, a new teacher would be mentored.

Then a new teacher would have to be judged effective or better for three years in a row in order to gain tenure.

The state’s largest teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, declined to comment on the measure.

Kevin Roberts, a spokesman for Christie, declined to comment on the bill as well but said Ruiz has “shown leadership and genuine interest.”

Debra Bradley of the New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association said the group was concerned that the bill takes away too many job protections for tenured educators.

“This bill really limits what your tenure rights are,” Bradley said. “Compromising the process because of a timeline is not the way to go.”

The missing component of the legislation is how teachers will be graded. The state is currently conducting a pilot program in 11 districts to help it develop a teacher evaluation system that officials hope will go statewide, on a test basis, beginning in the next school year and become active for teacher reviews in the 2013-14 school year.

Grover “Russ” Whitehurst, who heads an education policy center at the Brookings Institution in Washington, said that last component may become the most important.

Whitehurst noted that there was no requirement that at least some teachers be rated in the lower categories.

“The way it’s written in the bill, every teacher could be deemed effective,”

Whitehurst said. “I’d want to know what this means.”

Many states are requiring the lowest 20percent of teachers to be classified as ineffective, Whitehurst said.

Other states are struggling with how to grade teachers who don’t teach in subject areas such as math and English that are covered by annual state tests, Whitehurst said. That will affect how teachers respond.

“Teachers will want to go to the subjects and grades where you get an easier pass,” he said.

Lynne Strickland of the Garden State Coalition of Schools, which represents suburban school districts, said she could see numerous points of compromise in the legislation. She said the bill appeared to be on the fast track.

State Sen. Joseph Kyrillos Jr., R-Monmouth, who had offered Christie’s proposal in the Legislature, said he hoped the bill is considered soon.

He said progress on tenure reform had become “sluggish” but was glad to see Ruiz was ready to move on her bill.

“The (Democratic) legislative majority wasn’t there; I hope they’re there now… and do reform that’s long overdue,” Kyrillos said.