Prop. 74 Would Streamline Firing Process

By Duke Helfand and Joel Rubin, Los Angeles Times, July 29, 2005

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is promoting a voter initiative for a special Nov. 8 election that would change the way California teachers are hired and fired.

The measure, Proposition 74, would extend probationary periods for new teachers from two years to five and would streamline the process for dismissing permanent teachers.

The measure, and the state laws that govern teacher employment, can seem like a jumble of rules and regulations. Here is a primer to clear up some of the confusion.

Question: Do teachers get tenure?

Answer: No. Educators and others often mistakenly talk about "teacher tenure," giving the impression that public school teachers have lifelong job security.

The term traditionally refers to university and college professors who are awarded tenure based on their seniority and academic accomplishments. Tenure ensures academic freedom and enables institutions to attract top talent to the profession. Once awarded tenure, professors are virtually guaranteed a lifelong place on the school's faculty, but they can be removed under some circumstances.

Q: So, what job security do K-12 public school teachers really have?

A: Districts offer teachers "permanent" status after a two-year probationary period. But permanent teachers can be dismissed for a number of causes spelled out in state law. These causes include unsatisfactory performance, immoral conduct, dishonesty, felony criminal convictions and alcoholism or other drug abuse that make them unfit to instruct children.

Q: How common is it for permanent teachers to be fired for unsatisfactory performance?

A: Few teachers ever get dismissed for that because principals often don't have the time — or inclination — to document problems. It can take two years or more for school districts to prepare a dismissal case. Instead, schools often reassign poor teachers to other campuses, or teachers resign or retire, knowing that they are facing the dismissal process.

Schools have a much easier time getting rid of probationary teachers. Those teachers can be removed at the end of each school year without explanation as long as their districts notify them of the intention to remove them by March 15.

Q: How are teachers evaluated?

A: School principals typically evaluate teachers. For probationary teachers, that happens each year. Permanent teachers are generally evaluated at least every other year, although principals can do it annually if they wish. In rare cases, principals can elect to evaluate high-performing, veteran teachers once every five years. Teacher evaluations are based largely on formal, scheduled observations. Principals rate teachers in several skill areas, including the ability to plan lessons, explain material, cooperate with other teachers and show up to work on time. Principals must then make an overall judgment about whether teachers have met minimal standards for teaching.

Administrators also make unannounced visits to classrooms as part of the evaluation process.

Students' test scores can be one of many factors considered in a teacher's evaluation, according to school district officials.

Q: What constitutes unsatisfactory performance?

A: State law does not define unsatisfactory performance. As a result, there is no uniform measure used by school districts. Principals said they view teachers as unsatisfactory if they are continually unprepared for class, if they lack classroom management abilities — such as communication skills and adequate lesson plans — or if their attendance is erratic. Teachers also are viewed negatively if they cannot get along with colleagues, or are unwilling to heed guidance from mentors.

Q: How are poor-performing teachers dismissed?

A: Typically, a school district will designate a teacher as a "candidate for dismissal" after the instructor receives two unsatisfactory evaluations. In extreme cases, the Los Angeles Unified School District has been known to begin the termination process after only one subpar evaluation. Before getting rid of a teacher, however, schools often provide mentoring and other assistance to help the instructors improve. In many cases, under-performing teachers are counseled to leave voluntarily.

Q: What if a teacher won't leave?

A: If a teacher refuses to quit, the district will compile a portfolio of observations and other written evidence to justify dismissal.

Q: Is that it?

A: Not exactly. The teacher then has 30 days to request a hearing before a state-appointed administrative law judge and two teachers from outside the school district.

Q: Do teachers unions play any role in teacher dismissals?

A: Teachers unions often provide legal assistance to aid their members who have been identified as candidates for dismissal.

Teacher contracts also often include a "grievance process" that allows union representatives to protest a teacher's unsatisfactory evaluation. Staff from United Teachers Los Angeles, for example, are entitled to two meetings with district administrators if they believe a teacher has been evaluated unfairly.

If the case remains unresolved, the union can demand an arbitration hearing. This process is separate from the administrative hearing process mandated by state law.

When Teachers Don't Make the Grade

Governor says his plan will streamline the rules for getting rid of poor educators. Critics say the proposition won't work and might backfire.

By Duke Helfand and Joel Rubin, Los Angeles Times, July 31, 2005

Principal Faye Banton can walk through the classrooms of Edison Middle School in South Los Angeles and quickly identify her weakest teachers. But Banton knows she can't dismiss them without a drawn-out fight.

"It takes much too long to get rid of them," she said. "There is a real need for change."

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger believes he has the solution: a voter initiative that would extend the probationary period for new teachers and change the rules for firing veterans who perform poorly.

But critics, including the state's association of school boards, say the governor has missed the mark. The initiative would not achieve his popular goal and might, in fact, make removing problem teachers harder, they say.

Schwarzenegger, whose initiative will appear on the state ballot in a Nov. 8 special election, says the issue is simple.

"If you have someone who does not perform well in any job … you are able to get rid of that person. And we cannot do that" with teachers, he said.

Large numbers of government employees and workers in many unionized businesses share job protections similar to those of teachers. Unlike college and university professors, public school teachers do not receive lifetime tenure.

But the idea of reducing teachers' job protections is popular with many principals and parents concerned about the difficulty of removing poor-performing instructors. A Field Poll last month found broad support for the teacher measure among registered voters, with 59% supporting it and 35% opposed.

Under state law, school districts can dismiss teachers during their first two years on the job without providing any reason. After two years in the classroom, teachers earn the more protective "permanent status." Before dismissing a permanent-status teacher, district officials must meticulously document poor performance over time, formally declare the intention to dismiss the teacher and then give the instructor 90 days to improve.

Schwarzenegger's measure — known as the Put the Kids First Act — would authorize school districts to dismiss teachers summarily during the first five years.

The initiative also would simplify the process for dismissing teachers with permanent status, allowing district officials to fire a teacher after two consecutive unsatisfactory evaluations without declaring their intentions in advance or waiting 90 days.

Dismissed teachers would still be entitled to a hearing before an administrative judge and two credentialed teachers from outside their district. State law empowers such panels to uphold or overturn teacher dismissals.

The struggle to remove underperforming teachers is a familiar frustration in California school systems. Schools often provide extra training and mentoring for teachers who receive unsatisfactory evaluations in an effort to help them improve and stay on the job.

But rather than hassle with dismissing a teacher, which can consume hundreds of hours, some administrators shuffle problem instructors from school to school in a practice known to school officials as the "dance of the lemons."

The Los Angeles Unified School District has attempted to dismiss just 112 permanent teachers — or about one-quarter of 1% of the district's 43,000 instructors — over the last decade. Some were fired, but most resigned or retired.

"It takes two to three years to effectively remove someone who is not helpful to children in the classroom," Los Angeles schools Supt. Roy Romer said. "That's too long."

Banton, the Edison principal, agrees. The current evaluation system rarely results in the removal of a teacher from the classroom, she said.

"If there is a problem with a teacher, you need to get on it right away," Banton said. "I have a few teachers who shouldn't be in the classroom because someone else before me didn't do what needed to be done."

However, critics of Schwarzenegger's plan say it would not fix the problem.

Leaders of the California School Boards Assn. and other state education groups say the wording of the initiative could backfire because it requires two back-to-back negative evaluations. A marginal teacher could remain in the classroom for years by occasionally earning satisfactory evaluations, they say.

Schwarzenegger's aides disagree. They say the initiative would augment the existing dismissal system, giving school districts another tool to deal with underperforming teachers.

Critics also say the idea of lengthening a teacher's probationary period from two years to five ignores a far more serious problem: Many qualified teachers quit early in their careers, particularly in urban districts, including Los Angeles. About one-third of the teachers hired by the Los Angeles Unified School District in the 1998-99 school year left within five years, according to the district's most recent figures.

"If this is [Schwarzenegger's] education cornerstone, then he has failed," said state Supt. of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell, who signed the ballot argument against the initiative. "It shows the total absence of any thought of a comprehensive plan for education."

Some rank-and-file teachers say they recognize the need to simplify the dismissal rules for problem teachers, whom one instructor labeled "lost causes." But many teachers worry about losing legal protections that insulate them against the whims of principals.

"Yes, we need reform, but it doesn't sound like the governor has a good way to do it," said math teacher Carol Silva, who has spent 23 years at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. "I would like to see the procedures streamlined for people who will not change. But to just have two warnings and you're out, I don't like that. It could make it very arbitrary."

Art teacher Lisa Kantor bristled at the governor's call to extend the probationary period. As a probationary teacher, Kantor said, she is careful not to offend her principal at Hollywood High or anyone else on campus. Making the probationary status five years, she said, would only increase that sense of insecurity.

"You feel extremely vulnerable," said Kantor, 35. "You know to a certain degree that you're disposable. So you don't speak up at staff meetings, you don't get political, and you mind your Ps and Qs."

Schwarzenegger remains adamant about the five-year probation period.

"Two years is not enough time" for teachers to prove themselves, he said. "Let's give the teacher a chance in five years to really make it … and then have that job security for life."

The state's powerful teachers unions have temporarily increased dues to raise millions of dollars to fight Schwarzenegger's initiative and others on the November ballot that could slash education funding and curb union fundraising.

They call the teacher employment initiative an attack by Schwarzenegger on public education.

"Gov. Schwarzenegger is trying to destroy public schools and teachers," said California Teachers Assn. President Barbara Kerr. The initiative is "not going to improve achievement, not going to lower class sizes, not going to put more textbooks and materials into the classroom. It's going to hurt our students."

Both of the state's teachers unions — the teachers association and the California Federation of Teachers — have joined unions representing firefighters and other groups in mounting a television advertising campaign condemning Schwarzenegger for fostering a "phenomenon of anger" against teachers and other public employees.

It is a fight with national ramifications, as union leaders in Washington, D.C., warily eye California, fearful that Schwarzenegger's initiative could spread.

Officials from the National Education Assn. and the American Federation of Teachers said they were planning to channel money and other resources into California in the months leading up to the November election.

"California is an important state," said Edward J. McElroy, president of the teachers federation. "When things happen there, they have a tendency to echo in other places. Anyone who has an interest in hiring and retaining good teachers … will look at this as harmful."

Changing the personnel rules for teachers was not part of Schwarzenegger's original education agenda.

Instead, earlier this year, the governor promoted merit pay for teachers. His administration scrapped a proposal on that subject after learning it would have inadvertently prevented schools from firing teachers who commit criminal acts and engage in other misconduct, educators said.

And so the governor went looking for another education measure to put on the November ballot. He seized on a plan, aimed at changing hiring and firing practices, that was circulating through Sacramento, aides said.

Critics in Sacramento believe the governor was driven by a desire to divert attention away from another initiative on the November ballot that would reduce funding for schools. But Schwarzenegger's aides said the governor was motivated only by a desire to fix a system that in his view protects inferior teachers at the expense of schoolchildren.

"The governor believes that the overwhelming majority of all of California's public school teachers are highly skilled and dedicated public servants," said Todd Harris, one of the governor's political consultants.

"At the same time, everyone knows that there is a small percentage of teachers who frankly don't belong in the classroom," he said. "It's as simple as that."

Ruling favors fired teacher

By Zachary K. Johnson , Stockton Record, Jan 23, 2006

MANTECA - Manteca Unified School District must reinstate a teacher it improperly fired in 2004, according a tentative decision reached by a San Joaquin County Superior Court judge.

Judge Elizabeth Humphreys found that Great Valley Elementary School teacher Kristin Zgonc, 31, was a tenured employee who could not be fired without just cause.

Though the suit's main issue was Zgonc's tenure, the judge's decision revealed a paperwork discrepancy that raises the question of whether someone altered district personnel records that justified what may have been a wrongful termination. Zgonc claims the district altered her employment status on documents in her personnel file without her knowledge.

Manteca Unified also may have to pay Zgonc her salary and benefits retroactive to 2004, Humphreys wrote in a tentative decision released Jan. 3. The case is pending, and Manteca Unified has an opportunity to object to Humphreys' tentative decision.

Don Halseth, Manteca Unified's assistant superintendent of personnel, would not comment on the case, because it involves confidential personnel issues and ongoing litigation. The district's lawyer did not return phone calls about the case. Zgonc's attorney had no comment.

But in the case file, the two attorneys fought over Zgonc's status as an employee: Was she still considered a starting teacher on probation, or did she have the job security of a tenured employee?

One way teachers achieve tenure begins with an internship. A teacher who completes an internship program becomes tenured after working for one year and being hired to teach the next school year, according to state law cited by Humphreys.

Zgonc completed her internship June 2, 2001, continued to teach for Manteca Unified and became tenured when the 2002-03 school year began, according to the judge.

Though Zgonc began the 2000-01 school year at August Knodt Elementary School with an emergency teaching permit, she received a teaching credential though an internship program at California State University, Stanislaus, in December 2000.

She received a favorable performance review for her work during the 2001-02 school year. She then transferred to Great Valley, where she taught from 2002 until she was fired in March 2004.

The district didn't give her a reason for her dismissal, she said.

The district was justified in its firing of Zgonc, who was a probationary employee, Roberta Rowe, Manteca Unified's attorney, maintains in court papers.

Probationary employees can be let go without a reason, but firing a tenured employee is a lengthy process, said Lynda Nichols, a content consultant for the California Department of Education.

Rowe argued that Zgonc was still technically an intern until December 2002, because the district had not received documentation that she was a fully credentialed teacher.

Zgonc, however, claims she received her credential more than a year earlier and gave the document to the Manteca Unified personnel office on her birthday, Oct. 15, 2001. Humphreys sided with Zgonc.

Rowe also argued that granting Zgonc tenure contradicted the intent of the law for granting interns tenure, because Zgonc taught only part of her first year with an intern's credential.

The judge's tentative decision pointed out a paperwork discrepancy that Zgonc claims shows wrongdoing on the part of the school district.

School districts keep track of teachers' paths to tenure in their personnel files. But from year to year, Manteca Unified made changes to Zgonc's personnel file without her knowledge, according to court papers.

The file shows the school board approved a document that designated Zgonc as a probationary employee April 3, 2001. Zgonc's copy of that same document shows her status listed as an intern.

But no matter what the documents said, Zgonc never waived her right to tenure, Humphreys wrote.

Teacher putting down her pen after 69 yearsAfter spending the equivalent of two careers in the classroom, Florida's longest-serving public school teacher is retiring at last

BY Margaria Fichnter, Miami Herald, May 19, 2006

''She's always here by this time,'' says a student slumped at the foot of a nearby staircase, prompting an ominous twinge that perhaps the excitement of yesterday's boisterous retirement party over at First United Methodist, plus the prospect of teaching the creepy witches scene from Macbeth today for the gazillionth time, might have precipitated an unfortunate . . . well, never mind. And then a tiny, stooped figure rounds the corner and begins her sedate shuffle down the hall.

''I don't ever remember being late,'' Miss Haley says, eyes gleaming. ``I get up at 10 minutes to five, and I sign in between six-oh-five and six-oh-seven. This is what I'm locked into. This morning I did not open my baby blues until almost 6:30, so anybody who comes in tardy today has my sympathy.''

The end of the year always is a time of celebration and parting, but these days at Lakeland Senior High school, a deep velvet finality accompanies the rituals of transition and farewell. Hazel Haley, at 89 the longest-serving public-school teacher in Florida -- and, as far as anyone knows, in the country -- is retiring after 69 years, 67 of them in this school, 54 in this book-crammed, pink classroom. A few years ago, the Florida Legislature ruled school districts could hang on to veteran teachers, but now time has run out, and Miss Haley must go. Network camera crews have dropped by to record the milestone. Miss Haley's beloved LHS Dreadnaughts may have snared the national football title this year, but there is no question as to who the school's real champ is.

''She's the teacher I'll remember all my life,'' says senior Travis Britton. From now on, everything about this place will occur within a new, peculiar context: missing Miss Haley.

''I've always said that . . . we're such a big place, there's not anything that actually stops the world,'' says Mark Thomas, the first LHS principal in decades who will have to make decisions by himself. `` . . . The nice thing is, the kids next year won't know what they missed. I think they'll get a great education. I think they'll learn a lot about British literature, . . . but Hazel is Hazel.''

13,500 STUDENTS

Through the years, Miss Haley has taught an estimated 13,500 students, including Lawton Chiles, Florida's late governor and former U.S. senator. But he was no more adorable or beloved than anyone in this semester's three senior honors English classes.

''My inspiration every day comes from the satisfaction of being with these young people,'' Miss Haley says. ``You know, they give you so much back that is stimulating, exciting and fun, and that every day I will miss. That's been an integral part of my life for most of my life. I depend on it. It's not approval, . . . although sometimes I get that, and sometimes I don't. But it's a life force. It's an energy that comes from the children that nothing else can replace.''

Today's text is Macbeth's woeful Act IV, so murky with eye of newt, fearsome apparitions and murder, but the lesson, as always, quickly ricochets from the literary to the personal. ''Dears, we've all agreed that the second or third time that you do something you know is wrong, it's easier,'' Miss Haley says. ``When you sneak out on your parents, and you don't get caught, it becomes easier to sneak out a second and a third time.''

TEACHING ABOUT LIFE

''She doesn't just teach you about English, but she teaches you about life,'' says senior Tori Harvey, whose mother once sat in this classroom, too.

''She just lets you know that you are special,'' says Robin Harris, class of 1987, who named her 11-year-old daughter Haley, because, ``when you're in high school, you don't really know which way you're going. She just made me interested in school again. She made it exciting to learn.''

Harris and her daughter were among more than 500 fans -- community leaders, co-workers, friends, students and alums, even Miss Haley's mailman -- sipping punch and nibbling on cake and homemade cookies at the frothy Queen for a Day retirement party at the church. ''She said she remembered me,'' says Jo Kelly of Brandon, class of 1940, who turns 80 in July.

``Of course, she says that to everybody, but she might. I never forgot her.''

Here are a few things to remember about Miss Haley: She was a student here herself, graduating in 1933. She has never married and lives alone, but every student she has ever taught is dearly regarded as ''my child.'' She drives to school in Earl, her 1988 Grand Marquis. She is a lifelong Anglophile and will happily show off letters from Margaret Thatcher and the Queen.

An accomplished motivational speaker, she believes that life is a series of little joys.

She believes it is a long string of choices, that each choice exacts a consequence, and if you choose to say something naughty on the video being shot for your retirement party, you must be genteel when the editor calls your bluff and lets you spill these spicy beans: ``I love being with the children. . . . That's my whole life every single day, but when I come home, then I'm ready to close the door, take off my clothes and run naked through the house.''

Senior Krista Hulvebos says her sister had Miss Haley three years ago, ``and she'd always come home with these stories. Kids say that they relate closest to younger teachers, but Miss Haley beats them all, because she knows us. . . . I wish I could take her to college with me.''

LAST DAY OF TEACHING

Well, Krista cannot, but when Miss Haley leaves this classroom for the last time, she is not taking everything she might need, either, just that pink plush bear over in the corner, the lady-writers umbrella that hangs over her speaker's stand and her British flag. And that will be that. Or maybe not.

''I'm a great compensator, and I will find something else to do,'' Miss Haley says. ``I laughingly say I have had three job offers, so I may go to work.''

In the meantime, though, ``All right, sweethearts. Anybody have a question? Put the books up for me, boys. That's very kind. You're very thoughtful. OK, dears. Bye, sweetheart. Bye, little one. Bye, darling. Aren't they adorable?

``Bye.''

A Real Class Act

A teacher who, among other things, allegedly assaulted a co-worker in front of her fourth-graders gets to keep her job

BY Robert Gammon , East Bay Express, March 14, 2007

Should Oakland schoolteacher Doreen Callender be fired? Should she ever be allowed to teach again? You be the judge.

Callender has taught in Oakland public schools for 21 years, and when the 2006-07 school year began, she was assigned to a fourth-grade class at Emerson Elementary. The students at the North Oakland school are among the most troubled in the city and desperately need good teachers. Nearly 70 percent come from families living in poverty, and the school consistently scores among the worst in the state on standardized tests.

Indeed, some of Callender's fourth-graders had difficulty writing simple sentences, yet on September 14, just two weeks into the school year, she decided the best course for them was to watch a movie. The sixty-year-old teacher had a pressing personal issue to deal with on her classroom computer, so important that students later said she yelled at them when they tried to get her attention.

She was doing her son's college homework.

That afternoon, as Callender typed away with her back to her students, Joy Callison, a social worker at Emerson, knocked on the classroom door and walked in. Callison is used to dealing with anger-management issues — she provides emotional counseling to the school's problem kids. But she wasn't prepared for what was about to happen.

"I walked over to Doreen, who had her back to me, and I leaned over, lightly put my fingers on her back and said in a whisper, 'Ms. Callender,' when Doreen immediately turned around and screamed, 'Get away from me!'" the social worker wrote in a sworn statement. "Doreen then stood up, put her hands on me, turned me around, and roughly pushed me across the room." Callison said Callender continued to push her outside, yelled, "Stay out of my room," and slammed the door. And all this in front of the kids.

One of the students later told Principal Wendi Caporicci that the teacher had told her class she'd lost her temper because she'd mistaken Callison for one of them. According to another, Callender said she thought the social worker had been reading her computer screen. A third student said Callender took her outside and demanded to know what she told the principal, and when the student clammed up, Callender scolded her for keeping "secrets."

Principal Caporicci immediately suspended Callender and told her not to return until further notice. But a few days later the teacher defied the order. School officials said she sneaked back into her classroom, changed her computer passwords, and deleted her personal files so that school officials would not know what she was working on during the incident.

To summarize: According to the social worker, students, and district officials, Callender used a movie to babysit her class while she cheated for her son. When she thought she was caught, she erupted and roughed up a social worker in front of a bunch of nine-year-olds. Then she told her class she did it because she thought Callison was a student — a not-so-subtle threat to the children. She harangued a kid for keeping "secrets," and finally, violated a direct order to conceal her bad behavior.

Is all that enough to fire a teacher? Two weeks ago, it looked as though it might be. Now, apparently, it isn't.

For the past few months, it appeared Kimberly Statham, the state administrator who oversees Oakland schools, would take a tough stand. On October 25, Statham told Callender she planned to fire her, and placed the teacher on unpaid leave a week later. It was a bold move, because California's complicated tenure rules make it nearly impossible to terminate teachers.

But Statham and Roy Combs, the district's top attorney, had a plan. They decided this teacher's behavior had risen to the level of "immoral conduct," a designation that would allow them to circumvent some of the tenure regulations. "Yelling at and shoving the social worker out the door constitute immoral conduct in that it contravenes all acceptable standards of behavior for educators," Statham explained in her official accusation, dated January 11.

Under the usual tenure rules, Statham only could have issued a warning, which would allow Callender to keep teaching and give her at least ninety days to improve. But the immoral conduct charge kept Callender away from the kids until her termination hearing, which was scheduled for this week.

Predictably, Statham's decision outraged the Oakland teachers' union. Attorneys hired by the union to defend Callender sued the district on January 23 and asked a judge to throw out the immoral conduct charge. The union argued that California courts have traditionally limited the "immoral" stamp to crimes involving sex, drugs, and theft. "There is no California case that deems 'immoral' any teacher conduct outside these three areas," union attorney Jason Rabinowitz wrote in court filings.

The union also was worried that if Statham's decision went unchallenged, then Oakland and other school districts might increasingly use the immoral conduct charge as a way to circumvent tenure protections, cut off a teacher's livelihood, and force her to quit. "It's a troubling trend," Rabinowitz said in an interview last week "The danger is that anytime they want to get rid of a teacher ... they can assert immoral conduct where there is none. Then they can starve her out."

The district responded in court papers that Callender's behavior, when viewed in its entirety, was clearly immoral. Lawyer Combs also maintained that the courts have yet to clearly define immoral conduct in a classroom context. Regardless, he argued that the court should not interfere because Callender had not yet had her administrative termination hearing.

On February 23, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Winifred Smith agreed with Combs and dismissed the union's lawsuit. But despite the victory, Statham appeared to lose her nerve late last week; she and Combs agreed to settle the case and reinstate Callender.