Ruling on teacher layoffs a beacon of equity for kids
Opinion by Darrell Steinberg/Sacramento Bee
Darrell Steinberg is president pro tempore of the California Senate.
Last month, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge struck a major victory for civil rights by interpreting a section of the voluminous California Education Code to be about what's best for schoolchildren. Imagine that. In response to a lawsuit filed by attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union and Public Counsel, Judge William Highberger enjoined the Los Angeles Unified School District from laying off wildly disproportionate numbers of teachers at three middle schools. Because of state law generally requiring districts to lay off their least senior teachers first, these three schools, with mostly junior teachers, faced losses of as much as 60 percent of their faculty, compared to 15 percent or less at other district middle schools across town. (more...)