You can’t underestimate the power of quality educators in our schools. When children are taught by an effective teacher three years in a row it can change their life trajectories. So, one would think that we would do everything possible to ensure that all kids have access to the best teachers. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
Across the nation, some 160,000 teacher jobs are at risk because of a wave of layoffs that will likely occur this summer. To make matters worse, the majority of the country’s states and school districts conduct layoffs using an antiquated policy commonly referred to as “last in, first out,” or LIFO. The policy mandates that the last teacher hired is the first teacher fired, regardless of how good that teacher may be. Effectiveness with students plays no role in these employment decisions.
To put this issue into perspective, Georgia is facing a budget crisis of $1.7 billion, and legislators will likely make major cuts to education, which means 30,000 teachers may lose their jobs statewide. Unfortunately, because of “last in, first out” policies, our children stand to lose some of the best teachers.
Research shows that in schools, the factor that has the greatest impact on student achievement is the quality of the teacher in the classroom. With only 27 percent of Georgia’s eighth-graders on grade level in reading on the last National Assessment of Educational Progress exam, Georgia can’t afford to lose effective educators. If cuts are inevitable, we must ensure that they have minimal impact on children.
LIFO is a policy that’s bad for kids. Let us explain why:
First, research indicates that when districts conduct seniority-based layoffs, they end up firing some of their most highly effective educators. These are the inspiring and powerful teachers students remember for the rest of their lives, and Georgia will lose more of them with every LIFO layoff.
Second, LIFO policies increase the number of teachers that districts have to lay off. Because junior teachers make less money, Georgia’s schools will lose more teachers and more jobs as long as LIFO policies are permitted by law.
And finally, LIFO disproportionately negatively impacts the highest-need schools. These schools have larger numbers of new teachers, who are the first to lose their jobs in a layoff. High-income areas have more stable systems and fewer newer teachers, and they are less affected by budget cuts. Georgia’s low-income areas hardest hit by the mortgage crisis are already facing controversial cuts, and students who live in these areas can’t also afford to lose their best teachers. Yet LIFO will decimate the school systems of their best educators in the neighborhoods that need them the most.
Rules that mandate layoffs by seniority instead of quality do incredible damage to children and schools. An ineffective teacher generates only half the learning that an effective teacher does. Conversely, a highly effective teacher generates 50 percent more learning than an average teacher. This means that kids learn three times more in a highly effective teacher’s classroom than in an ineffective teacher’s.
In early December, I launched StudentsFirst, a national movement to defend the rights of children in public education. Our first major initiative is a national Save Great Teachers campaign in which we’re urging states to make policy changes ridding the nation’s public schools of LIFO polices. Let’s eliminate outdated LIFO and give our children the quality education they deserve.
Michelle Rhee is the former chancellor of DC Public Schools in Washington and CEO and founder of StudentsFirst.org
Tammy Garnes is co-chair of the Atlanta Public Schools Parental Advisory Council.
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