Georgia’s students scored big on Tuesday with a 58% to 42% victory for Amendment One. The Peach State’s ballot initiative on charter schools allows local communities to create more of these important options by amending the state’s constitution to allow other state and local agencies, in addition to local school boards, approve charter schools.

Washington state’s ballot initiative on charter schools is still looking favorable for reformers with a slight lead of 51% for passage. While still not declared a victory, it looks like Initiative 1240 will open up new educational opportunities for families with the creation of 40 new charter schools over the next 5 years. A modest proposal, but it would make Washington the 42nd state to adopt a charter school law and finally bring them into the 21st century of education delivery.

Idaho’s ballot left the fate of three laws, known as the Students Come First laws, up to voters. Unfortunately, the $1.2 million in NEA funding to squash these measures paid off. Voters turned down that reforms that would have paid teachers based on performance, phased out tenure, limited collective-bargaining, and expanded online learning opportunities.

With the signing yesterday of New Jersey’s new teacher tenure law, there was the expected fanfare about the stakeholders and bipartisan efforts that went into crafting the final bill.

Less attention was given to the two weeks of marathon meetings in early June that finally turned the legislation, the break coming when the governor relented on an issue that was once almost non-negotiable.

A half-dozen key players led by state Sen. Teresa Ruiz (D-Essex), the main crafter of the bill, met for hours at a time in a handful of locations to work out the details, according to several of those who attended.

Among those in the rooms were state Education Commissioner Chris Cerf, the top leadership for the New Jersey Education Association, and state Assemblyman Albert Coutinho (D-Essex), the driving force in the Assembly.

Just a week before the bill came to final vote in the Senate, Ruiz and Cerf even squeezed in a closed-door meeting at the Liberty Science Center after a special State Board of Education session held at the Jersey City museum.

“We lived on coffee dispensed from a vending machine,” Ruiz said yesterday of that meeting.

Ultimately, it was Gov. Chris Christie stepping back — at least for now — on an issue that was once a no-trespass line: his insistence on ending seniority rights for teachers in the case of layoffs.

“That was very near the end of the process, not a single moment, but suddenly it didn’t appear so much in the conversations any more,” said Vincent Giordano, the executive director of the New Jersey Education Association and one of the regulars at the table.

“When that issue started slowly fading away, without question, that helped smooth out other hurdles in the road,” he said. “That’s what bargaining is all about.”

Indeed, Teacher Effectiveness and Accountability for the Children of NJ (TEACH-NJ) ended up the product of lots of bargaining, a big theme yesterday as Christie and virtually all of the other players gathered for the signing in the library of a Middlesex Township middle school.

Alongside Christie and Ruiz at the lectern were Cerf, state Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-Gloucester), representing the Democratic leadership, and state Sen. Kevin O’Toole (R-Essex) for the Republicans.

But that was just the start. In the audience was the leadership of several major school associations, including Giordano and a strong showing of other officers and executives of the NJEA. Also invited were the state’s chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, the New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association, and the Garden State Coalition of Schools, the group representing mostly suburban districts.

Also present were the special-interest groups that have grown to prominence around this issue, including the New Jersey leaders of Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) and Better Education for Kids (B4K), two pro-reform organizations that had been integral in the tenure bill’s push and both publicly thanked by Christie.

In one notable seating arrangement, the outspoken executive director of the B4K, Derrell Bradford, even sat between the presidents of the NJEA and the state AFT.

Relations among the various groups and individuals have not always been warm — though they have been heated at times — especially between Christie and the NJEA, with each hurling insults for the past two years over a range of issues.

When it came to the tenure bill and all it represented, the hot spot was often seniority. This issue led to one of the first breaches back in 2010, when Christie rejected a compromise over seniority that had been struck by the NJEA and his former commissioner, Bret Schundler, in the first application for federal Race to the Top money.

Schundler ultimately was fired by Christie over another transgression in the doomed federal application, and Christie yesterday said the seniority issue was well down the list of disagreements he had with Schundler.

Nonetheless, Christie said it was something he ultimately compromised on to help the tenure bill proceed. He, too, said it was about trade-offs, and the bill’s direct link between a teacher’s tenure rights and positive evaluations was worth the give and take.

Starting in 2013-2014, teachers will need four years to get tenure and must have consistently positive evaluations to keep it. Conversely, two consecutive negative ratings will allow districts to begin dismissal proceedings.

“I never thought I would get everything I wanted,” Christie said. “And there comes a point when you need to make a decision as a leader that what you are getting is enough to make a difference.”

“The fact is, I still believe that [seniority] is a serious issue that we need to have more public discussion on,” he said. “But ultimately, my decision was there was enough really good things in this bill that I was not going to allow it not to become law because it didn’t have everything I wanted.”

What happens next, Christie said there would be new proposals to try again to end the rights known as “last in first out,” or LIFO.

Almost on cue, state Sen. Joseph Kyrillos (R-Monmouth) put out a press release yesterday in which he pledged new legislation to end LIFO, as well as press again for merit pay and new rules for teacher placements, other measures that didn’t survive the final bill. Kyrillos, who is the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, filed Christie’s first tenure reform bill.

“Let today’s accomplishment motivate this legislature to modify all tenure laws that protect failing educators and excessive public education costs,” Kyrillos said in a statement.

Cerf made a plug for it, too. He called the current LIFO law that gives preference to a teacher with a single day more in seniority, regardless of overall effectiveness, “indefensible from a moral or any other perspective.”

Later, he said it was not a matter of Christie bending on the issue. “That’s not bending; that’s timing and tactics,” Cerf said in an email.

Still, Ruiz yesterday made little or no mention at all about seniority or LIFO, instead listing a half-dozen other education issues she wants to tackle. And even Christie didn’t press too hard when asked for specifics.

“I imagine I’ll make lots of proposals in the next year,” he said.

In the end, Ruiz said she herself was never sure the final bill would come to fruition, let alone be signed with unanimous support from both Democrats and Republicans.

“I was told when I first asked staff to explore the subject matter that it was political suicide, and that I didn’t know anything about public education,” she said. “The emails and phone calls came in, and it was a moment where it was easy to give up.”

“But you sit back and realize that you can’t just not to do anything,” Ruiz said. “The truth is this was never about giving anyone a tool to get rid of low-performing teachers. It wasn’t about headlines or setting an agenda on a national level.”

“It was about what I thought was right and what we know, that the teacher has the greatest impact on our children and what happens in the classroom.”

WISCONSIN RE-CALL. Labor’s credibility is on the line today as voters in Wisconsin go to the ballot box for the gubernatorial recall election. Governor Walker’s all-out assault on collective bargaining sparked this most expensive election in the state’s history. Although most political pundits are giving the edge to Walker, voter turnout is key to the outcome. But, others suggest that if labor, including teacher unions, take a loss, it may not be as unexpected as thought…

LOVE’S LOST ON LABOR. Public opinion of teacher unions, even among teachers themselves, is on the wane. That’s according to a survey released by Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance and the journal Education Next. Between 2009-2011, the annual poll found little movement, with about 40% of respondents neutral in their views of teacher unions. But, this latest poll finds unions losing ground. Among teachers surveyed, the drop is even more dramatic. In 2011, 58% of teachers had a positive view of unions, dropping to 43% in 2012. Teachers holding a negative view of unions nearly doubled during the same time period, from 17% to 32%, all of which could explain the NEA’s reported loss of 200,000 members by 2014. The researchers responsibly say the decrease in teacher support could be due to an opinion that unions are not doing their job in Legislatures nationwide, given the hard hits they have taken on benefits, evaluations, etc. However, they also note that dwindling teacher support could emanate from a realization that unions are putting up roadblocks to meaningful reform.

UNION LIP SERVICE. Given the results of this poll and reform trends nationwide, Washington Post columnist Jay Mathew’s characterization of union “tolerance” and support for charters and evaluations is befuddling at best. In a recent column on Obama and Romney’s ed reform similarities, Mathews waxes on about their big difference – teacher unions. Edspresso takes on Mathews’ assertion that teacher unions alleged toleration of charters and teacher evaluations shows their seriousness about reform. Not really. Union rhetoric that spouts support for teacher evaluations and charter schools should not be confused with a dedicated drive to install evaluations with teeth and charters designed to make swift hiring/firing decisions and other changes to benefit students. And, Mathews should know that. He just needs to take a peek inside the on-average 153-page collective bargaining agreements, as did researchers Fred Hess (AEI) and Martin West (Brookings) in a Harvard report, A Better Bargain: Overhauling Teacher Collective Bargaining for the 21st Century, that calls for a major overhaul of collective bargaining. They write that today’s collective bargaining agreements were “designed for a bygone era” and “forestall changes to educational practices and compensation systems that are essential to enhancing teaching and learning.”

CHANGING FOCUS. Trending nationwide is an emphasis on teacher evaluations that include student testing, despite union outrage. Coupled with tenure reform, the goal is to keep top teachers in the classroom and hurry out the door to another profession those who fail to boost student achievement. In a profile of one thorny teacher dismissal case, Washington Post reporter Emma Brown gets it right. Because Fairfax County, Virginia, does not yet have an evaluation system that includes student testing, they rank their teachers based only on a list of county-approved techniques (use of technology, small group instruction). In this case, the teacher’s students’ scores were on par with others in her school, but allegedly she didn’t use all of the practices required by the district. Brown concludes correctly that “the focus is on how teachers teach, not whether students learn.” Seems as if Fairfax County needs to go back to the drawing board to remember why they are in existence.

NO GIANT STEP… but noteworthy still is the North Carolina Senate vote to pass legislation designed to improve education outcomes for students. The bill eliminates tenure, calling for all teachers to sign annual contracts, instead. Other provisions include: permitting the dismissal of teachers or principals working in low-performing schools who receive two consecutively sub-par evaluations; granting local boards the authority to establish their own performance-pay systems, which includes working in low-income/high at-risk schools, although this does not guarantee a quality teacher. Take a look at the Hoosier State (Indiana) for a real giant step forward for reform.

BACKSLIDE. The charter proposal that is percolating in Pennsylvania under a reform label is one that, unfortunately, would “create more bureaucracy, hinder the innovation in public education…and set Pennsylvania’s reform efforts back.” Read more on this critical issue in our CER Alert.

The Republican-led North Carolina Senate gave its final approval Monday evening to a public school overhaul bill after a Democratic amendment was defeated that would have deleted the measure’s proposed end to teacher tenure and weakened merit pay requirements.

The Senate passed the legislation on a party-line vote of 31-17, with GOP leaders calling the measure necessary to improve test scores, graduation rates and reading proficiency among children in early grades. But Democrats said the changes would demoralize teachers already discouraged by job losses, no pay raises since 2008 and other GOP-backed changes last year.

The Democrats’ amendment was defeated by the same margin as the full bill. Senate leader Phil Berger, a primary sponsor of the bill, called the Democratic ideas well-intentioned but “really represent a defense of the status quo.”

“What this bill tries to do is take us away from the status quo,” the Rockingham Republican said later in the debate.

The bill would scrap the current tenure system for veteran teachers that Republicans argue makes it difficult to fire teachers when administrators determine they are ineffective and gives them contracts of one to four school years. All teachers would get one-year contracts during this next school year. Tenure supporters argue that teachers need protections from political or other unfair firings.

The bill also would require school districts to create their own bonus or merit-pay programs to reward the most effective teachers. A program also would provide reading-intensive instruction in early grades. Most third-graders who didn’t show reading proficiency on tests by the end of third grade would be held back.

The bill now heads to the House. Republicans there have said they like the bill’s concepts but that there may not be enough time this session to pass it.

The Democratic amendment would have deleted the proposed teacher tenure change, made district merit-pay plans optional and would have given schools the ability to promote a student who doesn’t demonstrate reading proficiency.

Senate Minority Leader Martin Nesbitt, D-Buncombe, said teachers are doing a good job reducing dropout rates and helping students perform better on standardized tests. Nesbitt said teachers are having more pressure placed on them without commensurate extra help in the classroom.

The bill is “taking another slap at teachers, and we don’t need to be doing that,” Nesbitt said.

Sen. Bob Rucho, R-Mecklenburg, scoffed at Nesbitt’s characterization, saying Republicans are supportive of teachers who work hard to help their students.

The bill – which would cost the state about $44 million next year, rising to more than $80 million in the 2016-17 fiscal year – also would:

- change the state’s current system of grading school districts based on standardized test scores to a traditional grading method using a 0 to 100 scale and grades from A’s to F’s.

- provide teachers a $250 tax deduction for out-of-pocket classroom supplies they buy.

- set aside nearly 2,300 additional slots for North Carolina’s prekindergarten program.

An attempt to get rid of the tenure system for public school teachers in Missouri foundered in a test vote Tuesday evening in the state Senate.

Instead of eliminating job protection for teachers, senators voted 17-15 to set up a task force to study teacher salaries and effectiveness.

After the vote, the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Jane Cunningham, R-Chesterfield, shelved the gutted measure.

“What I saw today is nothing new,” Cunningham said in an interview. “It’s business as usual. It’s always putting government personnel above kids. It’s not putting kids at the back of the bus; it’s putting them under the bus and running over them.”

The bill has been a priority for school choice advocates such as Rex Sinquefield, who have pushed changes for teachers along with expanded charter schools and tax credit-supported scholarships for urban students to attend private schools.

Lobbyist Woody Cozad, who works on education issues for Sinquefield, was listening to the Senate debate from a nearby Senate office on Tuesday.

“The problem with tenure is that is has nothing to do with whether you’re doing a good job,” Cozad said.

But the state’s teacher groups have fought the bill, saying that teachers need protection from political pressure and that local school districts — not the state –  should evalute teacher performance.

Sen. David Pearce, R-Warrensburg, said the idea of eliminating tenure was a major change that needs a thorough study. His amendment proposed that a task force prepare a report on teacher effectiveness by Dec. 31.

His amendment passed with support from a bipartisan group of 10 Republicans and seven Democrats.

Afterward, Pearce said: “The bill today would have abolished tenure, and I think it was just a rash decision that the Senate was not prepared to make.”

While his amendment retained the tenure system, Pearce did not touch another change proposed by Cunningham. Still in the pending bill is a provision that would require school districts to base layoffs on teacher effectiveness rather than seniority.

Cunningham said she hopes to bring the issue up again.

“We’ll take a step back and figure out what we’re going to do,” she said.

(The bill is SB806.)

A local teachers union is challenging aspects of Michigan’s Teacher Tenure Act, saying in a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday that a controversial amendment made to the law last summer is unconstitutional.

The amendment barred school districts from using seniority as the determining factor when making layoff decisions — tossing aside traditional “last in, first out” procedures.

The amendment was part of sweeping changes to Michigan’s tenure act. Michael Lee, a Southfield attorney representing the Southfield Education Association, said he believes it is the first time the changes have been challenged in federal court.

The case, filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit, stems from a dispute in the Southfield Public Schools that began when the district laid off teachers last summer. Lee said the district did not follow its own procedures for recalling teachers — procedures that were put in place following passage of the tenure changes.

That part of the dispute is addressed in a lawsuit the union filed in circuit court last month. The federal lawsuit addresses the broader issue of whether the amendment itself is lawful.

Lee said the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized tenure as a property right in cases that go back as far as 1978.

“Once you pass legislation that says ignore tenure and people are laid off as a result, you have taken away that property right, and you have done that without due process,” Lee said.

Ari Adler, spokesman for state House Speaker Jase Bolger, R-Marshall, said the amendment was part of needed changes in tenure laws for teachers. Legislation to enact the changes originated in the House.

“The focus was to do what we could to protect good teachers and ensure a high quality of education for the students,” Adler said. “We were hearing a number of stories where there were young teachers who were outstanding in their profession but were being laid off simply because they did not have the seniority.”

Doug Pratt, spokesman for the Michigan Education Association — the state’s largest teachers union with 157,000 members — said his organization warned lawmakers last summer that “stripping away these collective-bargaining rights … leaves no ability to use the process that’s been used for years to figure out these issues. The only thing these employees can resort to is taking their case to federal court.”

Southfield Public Schools officials could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

The new rules — which redefine how New Jersey teachers earn and keep tenure — will not apply to “those who acquired tenure prior to the effective date” of the bill.

In other words, the bill put forward by state Sen. Teresa Ruiz (D-Essex), the bill that has been given the best chance yet of overhauling New Jersey’s century-old tenure system, will be grandfathered in. Read More…

One policy that is being targeted nationwide is teacher tenure. States are tossing aside historic protections in an era that demands high-performing teachers to produce higher achievement among students.

Check out CER’s map to see how your state stacks up when it comes to teacher quality.