CORRECTED
New York City schools that still have open teaching positions this fall will be assigned educators from the city鈥檚 鈥渁bsent teacher reserve鈥� pool, the city鈥檚 education department recently announced.
The school system expects to fill about 300 or 400 vacancies this way, and is calling it a 鈥渃ommon-sense policy鈥� for getting teachers back into schools. But , which the schools chancellor had pledged to avoid.
Teachers in the absent teacher reserve, or ATR, have lost their full-time teaching positions, often because their school was closed or their position eliminated. Some teachers in the ATR have been disciplined for misconduct or incompetence, and are eligible to return to the classroom but have not yet been rehired. They continue to receive full salary and benefits, and are rotated from school to school on a monthly basis.
The teachers can be hired at any time, but also remain in the pool indefinitely. At the end of the 2016-17 school year, there were 822 teachers in the ATR, the department says鈥攄own from more than 1,100 in the pool three years ago. Mayor Bill de Blasio has vowed to continue to shrink the pool, which costs an .
The Wall Street Journal鈥檚 editorial board wrote a , saying it could put 鈥減erverts, drunkards, and other classroom miscreants ... back in New York City schools.鈥�
Teachers in the ATR may be there because their schools closed, but they can apply for other positions in the district鈥檚 1,700 schools, the piece says. 鈥淚f a teacher can鈥檛 find another job in such a large system, there鈥檚 probably a good reason principals don鈥檛 want him.鈥�
Path to Permanent Hiring
Under the new policy, principals will have until October 15 to fill teaching positions in their schools. At that point, the education department will send someone from the ATR who has the proper licensing and credentials to fill the open role for the remainder of the school year.
At the end of the year, teachers who have received a rating of 鈥渆ffective鈥� or 鈥渉ighly effective鈥� on the observation portion of their evaluations will become permanent hires.
As I wrote recently, research has shown that principals almost never rate teachers as anything less than 鈥渆ffective鈥� on those evaluations.
Last year, the New York city education department paid salaries for some ATR teachers who were hired as an incentive to get principals to pull from the pool. It also offered severance packages鈥攅ither $50,000 or $35,000 and six months of health benefits鈥攖his summer for ATR teachers to resign or retire.
Chancellor Carmen Fari帽a, when , said that there 鈥渨ould be no forced placement of staff,鈥� Chalkbeat reported at the time.
Daniel Weisberg, the CEO of TNTP, a teacher training and advocacy group, and , 鈥淏reaking that promise now would have only one possible result: Schools across the city would face an influx of teachers with records of poor performance. Students in lower-income neighborhoods, where teaching positions have historically been most difficult to fill, would be hit hardest.鈥�
Department officials do not consider this new policy forced placement, Will Mantell, a deputy press secretary at the department said, because the teachers from the ATR are filling vacancies, not bumping other teachers out of positions.
鈥楾heir Work Should Be Respected鈥�
The teachers鈥� union is pleased with the new policy. 鈥淭hese changes reflect the UFT鈥檚 conviction that members of the ATR pool provide needed services to schools and that their work should be respected,鈥� said Michael Mulgrew, the president of the United Federation of Teachers.
Principals, no doubt, are wary of the change. 鈥淢any education conditions are outside the principal鈥檚 control. But most principals consider teacher quality as the most important condition they can control,鈥� Bob Farrace, the director of public affairs for the National Association of Secondary School Principals, wrote in an email. 鈥淔orcing students to endure a teacher who principals believe will be ineffective or鈥攚orse鈥攖oxic to the school community erodes a principal鈥檚 authority, makes it pretty difficult to hold a principal accountable for the school鈥檚 success, and most important, compromises student learning.鈥�
The New York City system received a rash of media attention starting in Groups of teachers who were awaiting termination hearings essentially sat in these rooms during contract work hours and collected their paychecks. In 2010, the and would instead 鈥渞eassign鈥� teachers to central offices to perform clerical duties. However, in the years after that, .
New York City education department officials emphasize that there鈥檚 a difference between the ATR teachers and those who have been 鈥渞eassigned.鈥� The reassigned teachers (those formerly in the rubber rooms), have not yet been through a hearing, and will not be used to fill teaching vacancies under the new policy.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this post misstated how the teachers from the ATR who filled vacancies would be paid. The schools they work at will pay their full salaries.
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