The Educated Guess � Steinberg bill remedies suit over layoffs

The Educated Guess � Steinberg bill remedies suit over layoffs

Steinberg bill remedies suit over layoffs

Posted in Equity issues, Tenure

Senate President pro Tem Darrell Steinberg has introduced a bill directly responding to issues raised in a February lawsuit challenging the large-scale layoffs of teachers at three Los Angeles Unified middle schools and in low-performing schools elsewhere in California. Passage of SB 1285 could go a long way toward settling a serious suit with uncommon speed.
The bill would explicitly give superintendents and schools boards the authority to override teacher seniority rules in order to prevent disproportionate layoffs at any school. A federal judge ruled last month that districts already have this power under state law; they just don’t use it.

Because layoffs tend to cluster at low-performing schools serving minority children, where teachers tend to be less experienced, Steinberg’s bill specifically addresses those situations: Superintendents would have to ensure that the proportion of layoffs in their worst performing schools – those in the lowest three deciles statewide – did not exceed the average for their districts.
The lead attorneys who filed the lawsuit, Catherine Lhamon of Public Counsel Law Center and Mark Rosenbaum of the ACLU of Southern California, were by