Backers of initiative to limit teacher tenure hold off until 2016
Few political fights would have been as bitter, or potentially as expensive, in 2014 as one to change -- and limit -- the tenure rules that have made firing some teachers more complicated.
But it's not to be.
On Tuesday, backers of the nascent campaign announced they have decided to stand down... for now.
"We have decided to push this effort to the 2016 ballot," said Matt David, the official proponent of the initiative (PDF) and a longtime GOP political strategist whose clients have included education activist Michelle Rhee.
The initiative would have created a new, annual review of teacher performance in California schools, and would have made that performance evaluation a key factor in any layoff decisions during tough fiscal times. The proposal would have also allowed the immediate firing of a teacher convicted of several felonies, including sex and drug crimes. Those dismissed teachers would have their state teaching credential permanently revoked.
The initiative, and a similar push in the Legislature to revamp teacher tenure rules, was sparked by high-profile scandals in some California schools, none more troubling than the 2012 arrest of a Los Angeles elementary teacher for multiple lewd acts involving his students.
But in the years since that arrest, policy experts and political powerhouses have struggled and fought over which changes should be made... and which could survive the opposition by teacher groups. That opposition was what doomed a high profile piece of legislationon the issue at the state Capitol in 2012.
Key to the decision to drop this teacher tenure do-over effort, said David, was the fiscal analysis of his initiative prepared by the independent Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO). That analysis argues that the startup cost of the new annual teacher evaluations could hit $1 billion statewide.
The potentially high price tag was likely a killer political argument for teachers groups