Overlawyered » teacher tenure

Labor and employment law roundup

Walter Olson — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 04:08:22 +0000

Court rebukes EEOC in big sex harassment class action against trucking firm [Memphis Commercial Appeal]
Union protects some dodgy educators: “Found to Have Misbehaved With Pupils, but Still Teaching” [New York Times]
Spain changes its labor law [Global Post]
Employment-law blogs debate employment at will [Jon Hyman]
James Sherk of Heritage on proposed Employee Rights Act;
Unlawful under Contracts Clause to alter public employee pensions? Really? [Secunda, Workplace Prof; Barnes v. Arizona State Ret. Sys., Ariz. Super. Ct., No. CV-2011-011638, 2/1/12]
Coalition challenges Connecticut governor’s executive order aimed at unionizing home health aides [Michael Tremoglie, Legal NewsLine]

Tags: Arizona, Connecticut, constitutional law, EEOC, employment at will, Europe, labor unions, Spain, teacher tenure

Labor and employment law roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

February 19 roundup

Walter Olson — Sun, 19 Feb 2012 17:19:17 +0000

Self-service arrangement: Pennsylvania judge charged with fixing her own parking tickets [Lancaster Online]
Economist cover story: “Over-regulated America“. Obama hesitant about heavy-handed regulation? Really? [Veronique de Rugy, NRO]
Argument for letting money market funds “break the buck” without federal backstop [David Henderson, EconLog]
Suing apps makers? “Entertainment Lawyers Go Wild for ‘Secondary’ Copyright Lawsuits” [WSJ Law Blog] SWAT raid on Kiwi copyright scofflaw? [Balko] Despite its editor’s views, NYT finds it hard to avoid breaching copyright laws itself [Carly Carioli, Boston Phoenix] “Contempt Sanctions Imposed on Copyright Troll Evan Stone” [Paul Alan Levy] More: “obscene materials can’t be copyrighted” offered as defense in illegal download case [Kerr]
Tenure terror: “Teacher in Los Angeles molest case reportedly paid $40G to drop appeal of firing” [AP]
FDA rejects lead-in-lipstick scare campaign [ACSH vs. Environmental Working Group]
A horror story of eyewitness I.D. [claim of DNA exoneration in Va. rape case; AP via Scott Greenfield]

Tags: banks, copyright, cosmetics, eyewitness testimony, judges, Los Angeles, New York Times, New Zealand, Pennsylvania, regulation and its reform, teacher tenure

February 19 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“Democrats vs. Teacher Unions: The Battle Heats Up”

Walter Olson — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 15:11:22 +0000

Walter Russell Mead notes a reformist initiative on teacher certification with perhaps an unexpected sponsor, the Democratic governor of Connecticut. [The American Interest; CTNewsJunkie.com]

P.S. On the ultimate frontier of teacher reform — the firing of bad teachers — see new reports from Troy Senik [Public Sector Inc.] and Marcus Winters [NY Post].

Tags: Connecticut, labor unions, schools, teacher tenure

“Democrats vs. Teacher Unions: The Battle Heats Up” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Tales from NYC’s “rubber room”

Walter Olson — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 14:39:34 +0000

The New York Post checks on on some unfireable teachers.

Tags: NYC, public employment, schools, teacher tenure

Tales from NYC’s “rubber room” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

September 19 roundup

Walter Olson — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 05:34:48 +0000

Educator: please don’t bring lawyers to parent-teacher meetings [Ron Clark, CNN] Steve Brill: what I found when I investigated NYC teacher “rubber rooms” [Reuters] “The Six Dumbest Things Schools Are Doing in the Name of Safety” [Cracked] School waterfall liability [Lincoln, Neb. Journal-Star]
As predicted: “Dodd-Frank Paperwork a Bonanza for Consultants and Lawyers” [NYT]
“Running out of common drugs” [Josh Bloom, NY Post] Pharmaceutical shortages: the role of Medicare price controls [Richard Epstein, Hoover; earlier here, here, etc.]
DoT insists on exposing private flight plans online. Yoo-hoo, privacy advocates? [Steve Chapman]
New class action law in Mexico includes loser-pays provision [WSJ]
Newt Gingrich candidacy revives memories of his 1995 call for death penalty (with “mass executions”) for drug smuggling [NYT archive via Josh Barro; see also @timothy_watson "Sounds kinda like Shariah Law to me.")
"Cy pres slush fund in Georgia under ethics investigation" [PoL]

Tags: aviation, class actions, cy pres, Georgia, illegal drugs, loser pays, Mexico, pharmaceuticals, schools, teacher tenure

September 19 roundup is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“Why bad teachers survive”

Walter Olson — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 12:07:50 +0000

A chart from the Chicago Tribune editorial opinion section on the stages needed to remove an inadequate Chicago educator.

Meanwhile, some Andrew Sullivan readers point out that contrasts between the public and private sectors can be overdone, since it can be legally troublesome for private managers, too, to fire poorly performing workers. I wrote a whole book tackling related themes some years back.

Tags: Chicago, teacher tenure, The Excuse Factory

“Why bad teachers survive” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“Why reinstate teachers fired for bad performance?”

Walter Olson — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 19:10:45 +0000

An arbitrator has reinstated 75 teachers dismissed by the Washington, D.C. school system during their 2-year probationary period — not after achieving tenure — for such infractions as perennial absence or tardiness, “rude and aggressive” behavior and “sketchy or nonexistent lesson plans.” “[Arbitrator Charles] Feigenbaum said that the teachers had been denied due process because they were not given reasons for their terminations. It’s a mind-boggling decision that essentially affords probationary teachers some of the rights that protect tenured teachers.” [Washington Post editorial] For another indication of the legal constraints on employee selection faced by the D.C. schools, see this 2001 post.

Tags: teacher tenure, Washington D.C.

“Why reinstate teachers fired for bad performance?” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Great moments in teacher tenure

Walter Olson — Sat, 27 Nov 2010 16:30:31 +0000

Julie Mack, Kalamazoo Gazette (via Mark Hemingway, Examiner):

In 1993, Chelsea High School teacher Stephen Leith shot to death his superintendent and wounded his principal and another teacher during a confrontation at the school. Leith was convicted of homicide and given a life sentence; from prison, he continued to pursue an appeal of his firing from Chelsea Public Schools, blaming his actions on medication.
“He murdered his superintendent. It’s crazy,” said Tom White, associate director of labor relations for [the] Michigan School Board Association.

Tags: Michigan, teacher tenure

Great moments in teacher tenure is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

Update: Teacher who allegedly branded cross onto student’s arm drops suit

Walter Olson — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 12:36:08 +0000

“An Ohio public school teacher accused of burning the mark of a cross on students’ arms said Friday he dropped a lawsuit over his firing because it would have interfered with a public airing of his complaint in a different venue.” [AP via Ed Brayton, earlier]

Tags: Ohio, religious discrimination, teacher tenure

Update: Teacher who allegedly branded cross onto student’s arm drops suit is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system

“NYC to stop paying teachers to do nothing”

Walter Olson — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 21:08:39 +0000

Press coverage of the “rubber rooms” was just too embarrassing, though it’s not clear that the new arrangements will solve much [Tabarrok; earlier here, here, etc.]

Tags: NYC, teacher tenure

“NYC to stop paying teachers to do nothing” is a post from Overlawyered - Chronicling the high cost of our legal system