Lawmakers Hope to Push Back Teacher Layoff Notification Date
Friday, March 02, 2012
Support is growing for a law that would move the date for teachers to receive layoff notices back from March 1 to June 1 after the Woonsocket School Committee last week voted to issue pink slips to all of its teachers as it works to trim a deficit in the school department.
The same issue occurred last year in Providence, when Mayor Angel Taveras made national headlines for his decision to fire every teacher in the capital city as he attempted to address his city’s $110 million structural deficit.
In the House chamber, Representative Jon Brien has introduced legislation that will move the layoff notification date back by three months. A similar bill on the Senate side has been introduced by Senators Lou DiPalma, Roger Picard, Christopher Ottiano, Minority Leader Dennis Algiere and Dawson Hodgson.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST“The March 1st deadline is creating uncertainty for my constituents including teachers, parents, and students in Woonsocket Public Schools,” Brien said. “There is no way that my community can know what its budget will look like in March. Woonsocket and municipalities around the state need more time to build their school budgets in order make prudent decisions that are in the best interest of students and taxpayers.”
Unnecessary and Frightening
DiPalma originally introduced the bill in the Senate last year, but it never came up for a vote. At the time, he said the legislation was aimed at preventing schools from having to issue as many unnecessary layoff notices to teachers due to budget uncertainties.
“Because of the way the state and local budget systems work, schools have very little information about what their budgets for the following year are going to look like by March 1, when they are required to notify any teachers who might be laid off,” DiPalma said. “The result is that they often have to issue excessive pink slips to dozens or, in extreme cases, even hundreds of teachers to make sure they’re covered for the worst-case scenario when their budgets are prepared. It’s an unnecessary, frightening and disruptive experience for teachers, students and parents, and it hangs over their heads from March 1 until the budget is settled months later.”
Supporters of pushing back the layoff date say moving it closer to the start of the next fiscal year gives schools have a better idea of how much funding they expect from the state and their municipalities. They also claim that as the new statewide school aid funding formula phases in over the next decade, the level of predictability will increase.
Critics of the legislation believe teachers are harmed because a deadline so close to summer gives them very little time to search for a new job.
Leaders Support Bill
Because budgetary decisions at the state level aren’t made until the final days of the fiscal year moving the deadline to June 1 likely wouldn’t mean that school officials would know the exact level of support they will be getting from the state and their municipalities when they issue the notices. But DiPalma said schools will still have more information than they would have in March. He said the unnecessary emotional toll layoff notices take on the school community would also be reduced.
“I understand that there has to be a deadline for notification, because teachers have to prepare if they might not be returning to their schools, and they need time to begin looking for other employment. But it doesn’t help them if they get a notice that’s based on a lack of information. It’s hard for them to know how real the threat is, but even so, it’s very disconcerting to have the threat of layoff hanging over the teacher’s head for the rest of the school year. I’m sure the situation isn’t helpful to the education process.”
The legislation has support from Mayor Taveras, who openly criticized the layoff notification process last year, and Education Commissioner Deborah Gist.
On Thursday, the Rhode Island Campaign for Achievement Now (RI-CAN) also issued a statement of support.
“Every year for the past several years, communities in fiscal distress such as Providence, Central Falls and most recently, Woonsocket, have been forced to send layoff notices to their entire teaching staff because of this outdated policy,” RI-CAN executive director Maryellen Butke wrote in an e-mail to supporters. “The March 1st notification law is just one of several antiquated staffing policies keeping us from prizing our talented teachers.”
A similar bill has been introduced by Senator Frank Ciccone, a top union leader in the General Assembly. Ciccone’s bill would move the notification date back to May 15, but it would also require that teachers with tenure be hired back first.
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