Cooler but still well above normal this week

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

By DONNA GORDON BLANKINSHIP, Associated Press


      SEATTLE (AP) - A study of Washington state teachers has found
that deciding layoffs based solely on which teachers have the least
seniority has a significant impact on students' ability to learn,
adding to a growing chorus calling for schools to take a hard look
at union contracts dictating who gets to keep their jobs.

 comes as tens of thousands of teachers around the
country stand to lose their jobs next year as federal stimulus
money dries up. In most places, union contracts and other policies
generally dictate that the least experienced teachers are the first
to go.


      But that comes at a price, according to the study released
exclusively to The Associated Press on Thursday.


      The Center for Education Data and Research at the University of
Washington, which studies the relationships between education
policies and student outcomes, looked at the 1,717 Washington state
teachers who were given layoff notices in either of the past two
school years.


      Most of those teachers were given notices because they had the
least seniority; nearly all of them ultimately kept their jobs, but
many face layoffs next year as federal stimulus money used to
retain them dries up.


      Researchers compared the actual layoff notice list with a list
of teachers who would have been laid off using a measurement of
effectiveness known as "value-added," in which teachers are
judged by the improvement of their students on standardized tests.


      Lacking seniority didn't necessarily equate with doing poorly on
the value-added measurement; about 275 teachers were on both lists.


      Using teachers' past performance, the researchers predicted the
performance of two hypothetical school systems: one in which the
teachers receiving notices had actually lost their jobs, and one in
which more than 1,300 of the lowest-performing teachers had been
fired instead.


      Dan Goldhaber, lead author of the study and the center's
director, projected that student achievement after seniority-based
layoffs would drop by an estimated 2.5 to 3.5 months of learning
per student, when compared to laying off the least effective
teachers.


      "If your bottom line is student achievement, then this is not
the best system," Goldhaber said.


      But determining who are the best and worst teachers is also
problematic, said Randi Weingarten, president of the American
Federation of Teachers, one of the country's largest teacher
unions.


      She criticized the research, saying it could further push school
districts toward evaluating teachers strictly on student test
scores. Teacher unions criticize the value-added method, pointing
to research showing it leads to inconsistent and inconclusive
results.


      "This report is actually going to do a tremendous disservice.
It will stop the real work that needs to be done to development
comprehensive evaluation systems," Weingarten said.


      A state education research expert said Goldhaber's conclusions
would be useful in the discussion about national education policy.


      "We'd like to see more research and more information on these
areas," said Joseph Koski, research and policy analyst, for
Washington's Professional Educator Standards Board.


      A young teacher in the Chicago suburbs who received a layoff
notice last spring but kept his job said he likes the idea of
keeping the best teachers, but wonders how schools can be sure
they're keeping the right people.


      "You're letting go of the people who probably know the most
about connecting with students," said Hemant Mehta, 27, who is in
his fourth year teaching high school math in Naperville, Ill. Age
and test scores are not the only ways to evaluate teachers, he
added.


      The research found that using a strict seniority system for
layoffs has a variety of other consequences, including:


      - School districts lay off more teachers to meet their budget
goals because junior teachers are paid less.


      - Some districts lay off teachers in high-demand and
hard-to-fill areas such as special education.


      - Seniority-based layoffs disproportionately hit schools where
the most needy kids are and the least senior teachers usually work.


      The value-added method of evaluating teachers has its
detractors, including Goldhaber. He said the method is less
accurate for teachers with shorter careers and more accurate when
comparing teachers who have the same amount of experience.


      The researchers were able to explore this issue statewide,
instead of using data from a single school district, because
Washington state is ahead of most other states in tracking student
and teacher data.


      The research drew support from others opposed to laying off
teachers with less experience.


      A class-action lawsuit brought by the ACLU against the Los
Angeles Unified School District argues that the district's
seniority-based layoffs denied students a fair and adequate
education because so many of the junior teachers taught in
low-income areas where teacher turnover is high and attracting good
teachers is difficult.


      "It confirms the common sense and backs it up with evidence
that many teachers being forced out in the current approach are
superstar teachers," said David Sapp, an attorney for
ACLU-Southern California. "It's further exacerbating the inequity
that exists."

Gallery

Education News

A study of Washington state teachers has found
that deciding layoffs based solely on which teachers have the least
seniority has a significant impact on students' ability to learn.

Study questions seniority-based teacher layoffs

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox