Hello, im ray suarez. A confident superior court judge decided that a state system of teacher turn hurts kids. The decision used in estimate 1 to 3 of teachers are ineffective, and in a huge state of california that means thousands of educators. Since most of those ineffective teachers, the judge reasoned too much in low income schools, if you give them the job protection offered by tenure youre hurting poor and minority students. Teacher tenure is an constitution, and it helped professionalize and depoliticize k through 12 education. Fast forward 100 years, Teachers Unions and tenure rules are not portrayed as helpful but road blocks. The tenure rules would not take investigate after the judges ruling survives an appeal. But when something this big happens in california, its news and likely will have an impact elsewhere. The judge ruled that californias teacher tenure laws deprive students of a quality Education Service and violate the civil rights under state constitution. The judge used Strong Language saying the statutes disproportionately effect poor and minority students and the evidence is coming. Indeed, it shocks the conscience. There were certain teach urgency you knew if you were stuck in their class you wouldnt learn a thing. That year would be a lost year. If we learned what education is it makes no sense that we wouldnt make sure that every kid has a good teacher every year. That case is calls vagara verse california. Their effort is backed by the Nonprofit Group students matter funded by Silicon Valley magnate david welsh. Teachers are allowed to apply for tenure after two years, they asked the last in first out regardless teachers are good or not, times with the least time on the job are the first to lose their jobs in budget cuts. Arnie duncan hailed the judges ruling saying that it could help dozens of students who are hurt. It has long pitted Teachers Unions against reformers. Three states in the district o District Of Columbia have limited tenure. Its one that is fun to watch and could have an impact nationwide. Does it follow that making it easier to fire teachers would help poor and minority kids get an enter education . Is the custom governing the work rules of employees work as something that qualifies as an equal protection case. Is it as hard as some will tell you to get rid of a bad teacher, and how should a new teacher get job protection after two years in the classroom . Is that good policy . All these questions are at the heart of the debate in the tea teacher tenure challenge. Dana goll steen, the our thorough of the teacher wars. Jonathan is president of the California Federation of teachers, and ted is the lead attorney for the student plaintiffs in the california teachers tenure case. Joshua, how does tenure work in california . If im a first or secondyear teacher is there a trigger date in which ill become protected by that tenure . Yes, thats a good question, ray. Your first two years youre a temporary teacher, you could be dismissed any time during those first two years without any explanation, and many teachers are let go after their first year for, for example, the Administration Says we dont want you back. Those first two years your probationary teacher. The administration decides you should move on then to permanent status you do that, but it should be clear, i want to make clear that at no time is this a lifetime guarantee of a job. It simply entitles you to due process once you pass your probationary period to decide whether you should move onto the next phase. You still are evaluated on a regular basis after your second year. But even in your third year of teaching youre still pretty young in the profession. Should you already be fared that kind of protection, the threshold being raised much higher to move you out if youre not doing a good job . So this was a key part of their argument. I spent more than 20 years in an inner City High School in los angeles. I saw a lot and interviewed a lot of beginning teachers. I was a mentor to many. Frankly, we could tell pretty early on whether that particular adult should be working with young people. It can happen quickly. It can certainly happen in two years. It just means that administration has to come in, visit your classroom on a regular basis, assess whether you have the make up to work with young people. You have the patience, not all adults have that patience. But i do think it can happen relatively quickly, and it certainly can happen in two years. Ted, you went to court to argue that this wasnt working for california kids. You havwhats the problem . Joshua makes a straightforward argument for how it operates at present. Joshua described a system that we dont have in california. What judge troy found, tenure can be made in less than 18 months before they have finished their training. Once theyre given permanent employment. Thats what its called. It triggers these arduous arbitrary 20step process to dismiss a teacher that everyone would agree is grossly ineffective, not teaching students. That creates a circle where those grossly ineffective teachers cant be dismissed. It can take years, two to ten years, hundreds of thousands of dollarsers those teachers stay in the classroom. They disproportionately end up in low and low Minority School districts. Those kids lose years of learning, lifetime earning capacity goes down. Its not even close. Its an irrational law that is creating disparity in our school season. Dana, were you convinced that from what you saw that these ineffective teachers were ending up heavily concentrated in poor and Minority Schools . There are effective and ineffective teachers in all sorts of schools that teach amen sorts of kids. I dont think there is rain doubt that ineffective and inexperienced teachers are clustered in low income schools. I think the question to ask is why is that that, and whether nullifying these laws will solve the problem. California is not the first step arguing over teen your and moving on ineffective teachers. I know the boards of education that ive covered in new york, chicago, elsewhere, how come tenure is such a widespread phenomenon . Where did it start in the first place . Wasnt it thought of as a good move in the first place . It dates back to 1909 when school reformers looked at europe and in particular germany, and they looked at german teachers who were thought to be higher performing teachers had tenure, and tha it was agreed that we should have tenure i in a profession that does not pay very well, that it would apractice people to the profession. Since then it has never stopped being controversial. Its important to realize when the Obama Administration took office, twothirds had weakened their tenure laws. California was a state that did not do that earlier on. What we see with the ruling in california, california sort of catching up to this debate that had a been going on in other states in the past five years. Were going to take a short break. When we come back well talk more about the fact that in many ways this was simply an equal protection case. What is it about teaching and the vulnerability of poor and minority students that makes the california decision such a hard fought case . Stay with us. This is inside story. Tomorrow, retired senator george mitchell. Not every problem in the world is an american problem. Shares his unique perspective on the future of america, home and abroad. People everywhere have certain things in common that are actually much greater than their differences. Every saturday, join us for exclusive, revealing and surprising talks with the most interesting people of our time. Talk to al jazeera, tomorrow, 5 eastern. Only on Al Jazeera America. Welcome back to inside story on Al Jazeera America. Im ray suarez. Through the long history of the National Debates about schools and quality of education a lot of plane and attention has been aimed at teachers. The california tenure system makes it very hard and timeconsuming and costly to fire an ineffective teacher. In the court case of vagara versus the state of california, a judge decided that the tenure cit system has to go. Was it proven, can it be proven in court that a tenure system lands more heavily on the backs of kids who need what Public Schooling has to offer the most . As judge troy found the evidence was overwhelming. Really, the unions and state admitted first low income and minority kids were getting a disproportionate number of grossly ineffective teachers. And it shows if a kid gets a grossly ineffective teacher for one year, they lose a year of their life. And the grossly ineffective teachers were being shuttled in the low income and Minority School districts. It wasnt even a close call in terms of the evidence. And the other thing that is special about california is our constitution includes a fundamental right to quality education. And education is really the launching pad, the platform for kids succeed in life, society, and across the board and to have low income and minority kids getting the brunt of thighs laws. Our experts were harvard, stanford from around the country testifyin testifying that these laws have a direct appreciable impact on kids in, thats what the judge found and the evidence was powerful. We do have control group. Is the situation much better in collective bargaining . No, student achievement is lower in states that dont have collective bargaining than those that do have collective bargaining. That said, tenure exists in even in states that dont have collective bargaining. Tenure precommittees collective bargaining and as i said it dates back to 1909. Collective barkin collective bargaining dates back to the 60s. What weather would good teachers come from if we get rid of bad teachers. I dont think it makes sense to give a teacher tenure after 18 months. I think we need two or three years. Teachers in surveys say theyre willing to wait five years. I think thats interesting that teachers say that. We do know from evidence when jobs are open in the poorest performing schools the Great Teachers do not rush to fill those jobs. There is data from all over the country that principals have a hugely difficult time to fill these jobs. Even when teachers are given 20,000 bonuses. 75 of the Great Teachers say no thanks, i dont want the extra money. I dont want to work in a struggling school. Its not just hard to fire teachers, but its hard to hire teachers and its important to remember that part of the equation. Had a about the members who have nothing to fear from the loss of tenure, are they rushing to the barricades to defend their brothers and sisters who might be rated ineffective teachers . Well, what were rushing to do is, number one, argue that our rights are not in conflict with the right of students. Teachers who have a right to advocate for kids. Teachers who have a right to stand up and say we should not be testing here, spending money here. Those give us the ability to be good teachers and were fighting to protect that right. I would challenge the notion that some how these under performing teachers some how flock to poor schools. Teachers dont decides where theyre going to get hired. Districts decide where theyre going to place teachers, and if its the case that teachers with some seniority decide to move to other parts of the city, they do so because the conditions in those schools are very challenging. Why keep it . Give me the case for keeping it . What as a mechanism would be lost if teacher tenure was removed. I want to get into this because this is key. What these folks would like to do is to create a system that evaluates teachers based on test scores. Thats the only mechanism they can find to evaluate literally thousands of teachers in a school district. In l. A. You have 35,000 teachers. And when teachers are laid off you have to assess teachers one through 35,000. We already have 10, 15, 20 years of seeing an educational te system deformed by test scores. It has narrowed curriculum, pushed out music, incentivized cheating and disrupts what we do in the classroom. While it may not an effective way of determining who comes and who goes, its better than all the other methods including subjective evaluation. Using how we fire teachers as a way of driving education reform is wrongheaded. This decision is not going to put an additional pencil in any childs hand. There is no Additional School books. No additional funding. Its not going to bring any librarians to schools. The notion that were going to fire our way to Educational Excellence is ludicrous. Being able to get rid of ineffective teachers is not going to help you one bit in addressing the other structural problems in education in california. Two things, ray. First, were not talking about firing our way to excellence. Were talking about grossly ineffective teachers who are harming kids every day. Everyone greed. Experts on the other side agreed, grossly ineffective teachers are in classrooms and harm children. Thats one piece of it. The other piece of it is were not talking about i monolithic looking at test scores, but a variety of things. Inclass performance, observation, are kids doing better. That would be one factor. The other part of the law that the judge struck down is the law that fires teachers without looking at how theyre doing their job. If theyre doing a great job they still get fired. Does our case resolve every issue, no. When we come back well talk about the prospects Going Forward for california and for tenured teachers everywhere. This is inside story. Stay with us. U. Al jazeera america, take a new look at news. Youre watching inside story on Al Jazeera America. Im ray suarez. Teacher teen your on this edition of the program in california the system that protects teachers jobs have been challenged by a judges decision to cra scrap the decision to offer tenure using the last hi hired, first fired, and making it difficult to let a teacher go. Dana, the Democratic Party and leading democratic elected officials are often portrayed as being in lock step with the Teachers Unions joined at the hip and so on. Why the as we heard arnie duncan supported the decision. Other democratic elected officials have. Is this not always cleaving needly and logically along partisan lines . Its not really a partisan issue any more, and that idea that the Democratic Party is in lock step with the Teachers Union is an old idea an its not relevant. President obama and other high profile democrats across the country, whether its corey booker , rahm emmanuel, the mayor in chicago, all these people are all considered critics, sometimes harsh critics of tea Teachers Unions. It will be interesting to see what happens in the lex president ial election. Hillary clinton when she ran in 20072008, she got both of those major Teachers Unions endorsements because shes less critical of Teachers Unions. Whether she makes more nice with the unions than president obama has. Jerry brown has depicted a friend of the unions. California is an Union Friendly state traditionally as well. Is this going to stand . Does this have a shot on appeal . Iyes, im not an expert on california politics. I would be interested in the thoughts of the other two guests. Jerry brown has been more sympathetic to the unions. This is a blow to the unions on friendly turf. Who is backing your side . I know you were working on behalf of students plaintiffs. I doubt they had a cookie sail or a bake sail at one of their classrooms to pay their fees. Who made sure whose case got proud. Who is paying your hourlies . Its a Great American story. A man named dave welsh in engineer entrepreneur looked around at what was happening to our Public School system in california, and said these laws must be wrong. This must be illegal. This cant go on. He formed the Group Students matter. Students matter have been going back to an eclectic array of organizations, some liberal, some conservative. Democrats, runs, to raise the funds to pursue a lawsuit like this. Weve done some of our work pro bo bono. But its been a partnership. I went to Public Schools. My law partners went to Public Schools. We want to create a platform for every kid to get an equal shot at a successful and fulfilling life. And dale welsh and students matter set out to do that. I think were going to win on appeal. One thing about trials you get to put on the evidence crossexamine witnesses and i think the constitution of california will trump those laws and well win on appeal. We feel good where we are. And we hope that it helps the state of california and nationwide. Are you prepared to fight an up hill battle to defend what your teachers have had for a long time. We have a long road to go. We are confident that the evidence is overwhelming, that these statutes dont deny equal access. But more importantly were going to continue to work hard, to educate kids, to explain these issues with are at times quite complicated. I will finally just say and just repeating the point that dana made earlier. If getting rid of seniority in due process were magic elicksers, then why is it that states like florida, georgia, louisiana, other antilabor states are not models of equity or academic excellence. The reason they are not is there are other profound issues than simply these protections for teachers that shape how kids are educated, and they have to do with poverty, funding for education, and a whole slew of other issues that these folks, frankly, can talk about, but are unwilling to act upon whereas the teacher unions, we fight to bring resources to the classroom. We actually put our mouth into practice. So im confident at the end of the day that were going to be victorious. Were at the end of our town. Joshua, dana, ted, great to talk to you all. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. That brings us to the end of this edition of inside story. Thanks for being with us. The program may be over but the conversation continues. We want to hear what you think about the issues raised on this or any days show. You can log on to our facebook page. You can send us your thoughts on twitter. Our handle is aj inside story am or reach me directly at ray suarez news. See you for the next inside story in washington. Im ray suarez. Now inroducing, the new al jazeea america mobile news app. Get our exclusive in depth, reporting when you want it. A global perspective wherever you are. The major headlines in context. Mashable says. Youll never miss the latest news they will continue looking for suvivors. The potential for Energy Production is huge. No noise, no clutter, just real reporting. The new Al Jazeera America mobile app, available for your apple and android mobile device. Download it now on america tonight, physicians unable to heal themselves. Doctors depression and high rate of suicide. Theres absolutely no reason that we should have a Health Care System that creates a dynamic in which our hellers are harming themselves. Our in Department Report raises the question, whats the prescription to cure doctors . Also tonight, front line iraq, america tonight finds an oilrich nation running on fumes. How long have you been
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