By Justin Zaremba | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
“As New Jersey schools draw up their annual budgets, some are finding that revenues aren’t enough to support all their needs. As a result, a few are contemplating or have approved laying off teachers and other staff for the 2017-2018 school year.
Here are some of the districts facing cuts, listed by those who are planning to lay off the fewest staff members to the districts that are facing the most severe cuts.”
By Karen Rouse | WNYC
“At a Freehold, N.J., elementary school, more than 500 students share a vast, open space where bookshelves, whiteboards, storage cubbies and other pieces of furniture are the only boundaries between classrooms.
There are no walls because the building was originally designed in the 1970s to be a smaller Montessori school, Superintendent Rocco Tomazic explained during a recent tour. But now, it’s noisy and crowded, and the district doesn’t have the money to move each of the classes into traditional closed classrooms — the kind with walls, and a lot fewer distractions.”
By The Star Ledger Editorial Board
“The Newark parents who sued, arguing that forcing school districts to prioritize seniority over teacher talent hurts their kids, just lost their case in court. That’s a real blow to students, who don’t have a special interest union.”
By Star-Ledger Editorial Board
“The Newark parents who sued, arguing that forcing school districts to prioritize seniority over teacher talent hurts their kids, just lost their case in court. That’s a real blow to students, who don’t have a special interest union.
But make no mistake: this fight is far from over. Their families can appeal, of course, and while it may be a long shot to argue that the state constitution should decide this, the issue is in no way settled – because changing the policy itself is essential.”
By Matthew Frankel | NJ Observer
“It is no secret that both in policy and politics, the Goliath in New Jersey is the leadership of the New Jersey Education Association.
Through powerful lobbying efforts in Trenton, massive investments in political action committees, statewide marketing campaigns and an army of lawyers stationed throughout the state, the NJEA spends tens of millions of dollars each year to control the discourse and debate within our state. Even in this day and age, facts matter, and these are facts: The money the NJEA leadership spends is simply unmatched, and it is a significant reason that New Jersey’s education status quo has not changed in decades.”
By Matthew Frankel | Observer
“It is no secret that both in policy and politics, the Goliath in New Jersey is the leadership of the New Jersey Education Association.
Through powerful lobbying efforts in Trenton, massive investments in political action committees, statewide marketing campaigns and an army of lawyers stationed throughout the state, the NJEA spends tens of millions of dollars each year to control the discourse and debate within our state. Even in this day and age, facts matter, and these are facts: The money the NJEA leadership spends is simply unmatched, and it is a significant reason that New Jersey’s education status quo has not changed in decades.”
By Beena Raghavendran | StarTribune
Protesters crowded a Minneapolis Public Schools board meeting to complain about several educators of color who lost their jobs during budget cuts.
About 100 protesters demanded that the school board and Superintendent Ed Graff rehire educators of color who were fired.
The protest made Tuesday’s meeting the most chaotic since Graff began his job in July, and ended in passage of a school board resolution to rehire or give a formal recommendation to rehire seven educators.
By Laura Waters | New York School Talk
Two days before Christmas, seven-year-old Ka’veon Wilson came to class at P.S. 194 in Harlem with a tray of cupcakes for his classmates. His teacher, Osman Couey, shoved him out the door and locked it. Ka’veon, a special education student, started banging on the door to get back in. School psychologist Steven Castiglia heard the commotion and knocked on the classroom door. Couey unlocked it and Ka’veon tried to squeeze in. According to the NY Post,
Castiglia testified that Couey “threw” the boy into his legs. “It was just like he was bowling,” the psychologist said. “He (Ka’veon) flew into my ankles and it stung.”
A video surveillance camera captured Ka’veon being tossed across the hallway.
By Josh Verges | Twin Cities Pioneer Press
Minnesota’s 2014 teacher of the year is losing his job amid a legislative debate over school funding and job protections for veteran teachers.
Tom Rademacher on his personal blog Sunday criticized the so-called “Last In, First Out” (LIFO) policies that Republican lawmakers for years have tried to eliminate.
“We are doing no one, certainly not students and teachers, any favors by making new teachers start over and over and over again,” he said.
But Rademacher said the larger problem is a lack of funding for schools.
NJ Left Behind
“Earlier this month, a short animated video was released to the public explaining New Jersey’s quality-blind “last in, first out” (LIFO) teacher layoff statute. As one of ten remaining states in the country that mandates LIFO, the law requires school districts to lay off teachers based only on the date when they started teaching in the district, with the newest teachers losing their jobs first.
By forbidding administrators from considering classroom effectiveness, this law runs counter to the overwhelming research consistently showing that teacher quality is the most important in-school factor affecting student learning.
In November, six Newark parents filed a lawsuit in Mercer County Superior Court called H.G. v. Harrington that asserts that New Jersey’s LIFO law violates students’ constitutional right to a thorough and efficient education.
After viewing the video, I reached out to one of the parents, Wendy S., one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. Here are my questions and her answers.”