Alan D. Bersin
California Secretary of Education and Member of the State Board of Education; former Superintendent of the San Diego Unified School District
Joel I. Klein
Chancellor, New York City Department of Education
Michael D. Casserly
Executive Director, The Council of Great City Schools
Kati Haycock
Director, The Education Trust
Kevin M. Johnson
Founder and Chairman, St. HOPE; three-time NBA All-Star
Dr. C. Kent McGuire
Dean, College of Education, Temple University
Wendy Puriefoy
President, Public Education Network
Andrew J. Rotherham
Co-Director, Education Sector; and Senior Fellow, Progressive Policy Institute
Stefanie Sanford
Senior Policy Officer, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Ronald A. Wolk
Founding Editor, Education Week Alan D. Bersin
California Secretary of Education and Member of the State Board of Education; former Superintendent of the San Diego Unified School District
The single most important challenge in urban education is recruiting, hiring, and retaining good teachers. In 2005, we accept approaches to hiring and assigning teachers that continue to hinder effective district and school leadership. New research by The New Teacher Project confirms what I saw as a Superintendent: one of the biggest barriers to attracting the people we need is a set of collectively bargained staffing rules that keeps urban schools from hiring and retaining the strongest teachers and undermines the staff stability that is required to implement and sustain meaningful reforms at the school level.
These staffing rules once may have made sense but they have become anachronistic in the 21st century. We have to revisit labor agreements and district practices to address our current needs. Contract language that micromanages teacher assignment and transfer processes and places an absolute premium on seniority, over quality or fit, flies in the face of more than a decade's worth of school-based reforms. Unintended Consequences shows how these outdated rules restrict our ability to hire promising candidates, keep the strongest novices and secure great teachers for classrooms where they are most needed. Failure to renegotiate these work rules can no longer be reconciled with properly serving our students or supporting our teachers.
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Chancellor, New York City Department of Education
This is an important time for the New York City public schools, and we are making great strides toward our goal of creating a system of 1400 great schools. We have been able to make these strides in part due to the compelling research contained in Unintended Consequences.
For too long, we have operated within a system where principals have had to hire teachers without adequate consideration of quality or suitability. In our system, thousands of teachers are imposed on schools each year, through either a seniority transfer plan, or excessing and bumping, and all too often poorly performing teachers are passed from school to school.
Fortunately for New York City's students, together with the United Federation of Teachers, we have negotiated a new contract that eliminates "bumping rights" and transfers based solely on seniority. Teachers will still be able to apply for transfers. Principals and their staffs, however, will now be able to interview all prospective candidates and hire the person they believe is the best match for the job. And, capable young teachers will no longer face the risk of being displaced from their jobs. These important and overdue changes will help us create a system that is properly aligned with accountability so that principals have the power to decide who will work in the schools they are charged with leading.
Enough cannot be said about the willingness of our nation's largest teachers union to tackle head-on the unintended consequences of "bumping rights" on our teachers and students, and to negotiate reforms to transfer and staffing rules. Equally important, we are grateful to The New Teacher Project for providing the analysis that was critical in demonstrating the compelling need for reform. By laying out so clearly the devastating effects of these rules on students, teachers, and the entire school system, it was possible to talk openly, honestly and plainly about the types of systemic solutions necessary to ensure that principals and their hiring teams can build a cohesive staff of educators who share an educational philosophy and can together create meaningful improvements in their schools.
I am confident that we are on the right track and that these changes, while only one part of a much larger picture, will help us meet our goal of designing a school system that works for all of our students. By providing schools with more authority to hire, and keep, the right teachers for the right jobs, we have taken an important step toward a more equitable and effective system where teachers, schools, and, most importantly, our students can thrive.
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Executive Director, The Council of Great City Schools
Unintended Consequences analyzes the impact of contractual transfer and excess rules on schools and students in five urban districts. My experience in urban school districts tells me that the findings will resonate with cities and other school districts nationwide. As Unintended Consequences points out, there are a number of barriers to placing high-quality teachers in every urban classroom that we need to be addressing. Calling for a debate on this issue is not about taking sides; rather, it is about the desire we all share of creating urban school systems in which all students can achieve at high levels.
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Director, The Education Trust
Unintended Consequences makes the strongest case to date on why we must revamp the seniority staffing rules in current school district/teachers union contracts if we are serious about closing the achievement gaps among students in urban school districts and between these students and their suburban counterparts.
Drawing on extensive data gathered in five representative urban districts, Unintended Consequences lays bare the systemic problem that occurs when these rules override the staffing needs of schools and the educational needs of students. The result is systems that hire too late to secure the most talented teacher applicants, bump novice teachers, and require schools to hire with little or no choice.
It is encouraging to see the nation's largest school district (New York City) taking the lead on this critical issue and addressing the imbalance created by transfer and excess rules. Providing protections for high-quality senior teachers who are of value to the schools is right and fair, but those protections must be balanced with the rights and needs of students in our nation's cities.
Showing that all schools in urban districts are adversely affected by these rules, The New Teacher Project lays out a detailed and systemic solution to this systemic problem. It is our sincere hope that union leaders and management in districts across the country read this report and ask themselves if the seniority staffing rules in their own district may be thwarting the day-to-day efforts of educators to achieve real and sustained gains in student performance, and then move to make necessary changes.
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Founder and Chairman, St. HOPE; three-time NBA All-Star
Improving educational outcomes for students in urban schools is the foundation of St. HOPE. We know from our experience that the quality of teachers is central to raising the achievement of our students, and everything that can be done must be done to ensure that students, like those we serve at St. HOPE, are taught by great teachers.
If we want to level the playing field for urban students, then schools need more control over whom they hire. Professional coaches can't be held accountable for winning if they are forced to play athletes who don't have the skills or don't fit the needs of the team. Of course, education isn't a game; there's too much at stake. But, in the same way that a coach cannot win without being able to pick his or her team, schools cannot succeed unless those who lead them are empowered to choose the best team of teachers for their students.
The New Teacher Project's report demonstrates the many ways that staffing rules in big city contracts keep that from happening, negatively affecting hundreds of thousands of students in schools across the country. There are many fabulously talented teachers out there, but unless they are the right fit for a school, they cannot help their students win academically. It's time to take an honest look at the effects of these rules on urban schools, and start working to level the playing field for students, teachers, and administrators. By doing so, we all win.
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Dean, College of Education, Temple University
Too often, attempts to engage in a reasoned discussion of union staffing rules devolve into senseless stand-offs that pit "management" against "labor," and "pro-teacher" groups against "anti-teacher" ones. But the reality is that many teachers are not well served by the rules addressed in Unintended Consequences: there are the novice teachers cut from their positions even though the principal wants to keep them and they want to stay; others who are displaced from their jobs because their positions are wanted by more senior teachers; and still more who are hired so late in the summer that they enter challenging classrooms with little or no time for preparation or induction. The retention problems in our industry are well known. To the extent these rules contribute to the revolving door, it must be closed.
So even if new and novice teachers get the short end of the stick, what about the other teachers in these systems? It can be argued that these rules disadvantage any teacher, regardless of seniority, who wants to make an effective match with a principal and a school, be part of a unified team of high-quality teachers, and work for an effective school leader who has the authority to make good staffing decisions.
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President, Public Education Network
Do teacher assignment rules create an environment in which student achievement is the priority? For too long, this question has been deemed "off limits" for reasonable discussion. The New Teacher Project's report, however, changes that. By providing a data-driven assessment of what happens "on the ground," as well as a balanced set of recommendations that strive to serve both teachers and students, this report certainly gives us a sufficient basis on which to reexamine these rules. It is now up to adults across the political spectrum to find the common ground on which the needs of students can be met.
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Co-Director, Education Sector; and Senior Fellow, Progressive Policy Institute
Unintended Consequences calls attention to a serious problem in urban education: the impact of teacher transfer and excess provisions. For too long discussion about whether these provisions have adverse consequences for students has been more ideological than empirical. This important new analysis adds substantial data to the conversation and shows that while these provisions arose for understandable reasons, they are at odds with the best interests of students and today's efforts to improve urban schools.
Good teachers work incredibly hard and deserve better than they generally get. However, it's possible to accord teachers the respect they deserve and also address these problems. Toward this goal, Unintended Consequences offers sensible and measured recommendations that are at once fair to teachers but also serious in their potential. Though critics will continue to dismiss both the significance of the problem and these solutions, the data in this report make clear that it is long past time to reform rules that elevate what is desirable for adults above what is good for students.
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Senior Policy Officer, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
In our work in high schools across the country, we have advocated the new 3 R's: a rigorous curriculum for all students; relevant content and experiences that tie curriculum to the real worlds of college, work and citizenship; and relationships schools where students are known and each student has an adult advocate.
Our experience has vividly illustrated to us that teachers are not interchangeable and that meaningful whole school reform and the creation of great new schools - depend on the ability to build a high-quality team committed to a common mission. Educators need the ability to build a team, choose an environment and be appreciated and rewarded for quality work. This work by The New Teacher Project is an important contribution to the critical conversation of building a world-class teaching profession for the 21st century and assuring that top talent is drawn to the neediest schools.
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Founding Editor, Education Week
This New Teacher Project report makes painfully clear that the policies and practices that govern the hiring of teachers are undermining the effectiveness and quality of the nation's urban schools. Because these policies and practices are rooted in teacher union contracts, this report will be controversial. If the unions will feel they have been attacked and respond in kind, the opportunity to improve the way urban schools are staffed will be lost. There are solutions to these problems, and the report recommends some. It is in everyone's best interest, especially the children's, for the parties involved to sit down together and address the issues. We need to focus not on how we got into this situation, but how we get out of it.
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Percentage of participants in TNTP's Practioner Teacher Program who said the program made them more effective teachers
