February 25, 2011
“Quality-Blind” Layoff Policies in 14 States Put Jobs of Great Teachers at Risk

NEW YORK, NY—As school districts across the country grapple with massive budget cuts, thousands of great teachers could lose their jobs despite a track record of success in the classroom, according to an analysis released today by The New Teacher Project (TNTP). “The Case Against Quality-Blind Layoffs” identifies 14 states where top teachers are in greatest danger of losing their jobs this spring, because of laws making it illegal for schools to consider job performance in making layoff decisions.

Revenue shortfalls in 10 of these states are projected to be greater than 10 percent, making layoffs a serious possibility. Schools in these states are mandated to lay off the least senior teachers first, meaning that success in the classroom provides no additional job security. TNTP’s analysis also summarizes recent research showing that that these quality-blind policies—sometimes called “last-in, first-out,” or “LIFO”—strip schools of great teachers, with potentially devastating consequences for the neediest students.

“This is a real test of leadership for policymakers across the country,” said Timothy Daly, president of TNTP. “Almost nobody disputes that quality-blind layoff policies have disastrous consequences for students and teachers. Will policymakers really stand by and allow great teachers to lose their jobs because of these outdated rules? There’s still time to put common sense back into layoff policies—but we have to take action right now.”

The 14 states that mandate quality-blind layoffs are Alaska, California, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, West Virginia and Wisconsin. A combined 40 percent of the nation’s teachers (1.25 million) work in these states.

Despite a national emphasis on effective teachers in recent years, only the District of Columbia and three states—Arizona, Colorado and Oklahoma—require schools to make job performance a major factor in teacher layoff decisions. Legislation requiring quality-based layoffs is currently pending in several states, including Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, New York and Washington.

Research shows that basing layoff decisions on seniority alone has disastrous consequences for students, teachers and school communities:

• Better teachers are forced to leave classrooms, while lower-performing teachers remain.
• Schools serving the poorest students bear the brunt of the layoffs—an average of 25% more than wealthier schools.
• Students in affected classrooms lose an average of 2.5-3.5 months of learning a year—the equivalent of ending the school year in March.
• More total job losses are necessary to achieve a given budget reduction, since quality-blind layoffs affect only the newest, lowest-paid teachers.

Furthermore, a policy brief TNTP released last year (“A Smarter Teacher Layoff System”) showed that many teachers oppose quality-blind layoffs. It reported the results of a survey conducted in two large urban districts in which a majority of teachers at every experience level favored considering factors other than seniority in layoff decisions. That policy brief also described how districts can quickly implement a quality-based approach to layoffs based primarily on teachers’ attendance, their overall performance rating on their regular evaluation, and their classroom management rating. Under a quality-based policy, veteran teachers would generally still be laid off less often, because they tend to perform better. But high-performing novices would no longer be blindly dismissed.

“It’s not surprising that so many teachers oppose policies that treat their accomplishments in the classroom as worthless,” said Daly. “The question isn’t whether seniority should play a role in layoff decisions—it’s whether we should continue pretending that nothing else matters.”

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About TNTP

TNTP strives to end the injustice of educational inequality by providing excellent teachers to the students who need them most and by advancing policies and practices that ensure effective teaching in every classroom. A national nonprofit organization founded by teachers, TNTP is driven by the knowledge that effective teachers have a greater impact on student achievement than any other school factor. In response, TNTP develops customized programs and policy interventions that enable education leaders to find, develop and keep great teachers. Since its inception in 1997, TNTP has recruited or trained approximately 48,000 teachers—mainly through its highly selective Teaching Fellows programs—benefiting an estimated 8 million students. TNTP has also released a series of acclaimed studies of the policies and practices that affect the quality of the nation’s teacher workforce, most recently including The Widget Effect (2009) and Teacher Evaluation 2.0 (2010). Today TNTP is active in more than 25 cities, including Baltimore, Chicago, Denver, New Orleans, New York, and Oakland, among others.