Legislature must move teacher-effectiveness bills

WILL enough Democratic lawmakers stand up to the powerful state teachers union to ensure teacher-effectiveness bills survive Thursday's deadline for moving out of House committees?

A similar deadline for the Senate is Monday. The hope is that enough lawmakers are more concerned about the education of children than appeasing the Washington Education Association. The teachers union opposes House Bill 1609 and Senate Bill 5399, which would make effectiveness more of a deciding factor than seniority in layoff decisions.

If legislators kill the bills with inaction, they are ignoring the calls of parents, education groups and brave teachers who've gone against their union on this issue. Lawmakers will be thumbing their noses at informed research, including the University of Washington's study underscoring the academic harm to students when layoffs rob classrooms of effective teachers.

Worse, lawmakers will be prizing their own political skins above children. One wonders how much support the bills' sponsors, Rep. Eric Pettigrew, D-Seattle, and Sen. Rodney Tom, D-Medina, would be getting if the WEA played the 800-pound gorilla in favor of the proposals rather than against.

Current budget challenges make teacher layoffs inevitable. The bills would allow school districts to keep the best teachers in the classroom during good and bad budget times. The current system favoring seniority gives greater priority to a senior teacher on probation than a junior one named Teacher of the Year.

If these bills don't survive, special ire should be reserved for Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe, chair of the Senate Committee on Early Learning and K-12 Education. In contrast to the open-mindedness shown by her House counterpart, Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos, McAuliffe has refused to schedule the teacher-effectiveness bill for a hearing.

Her unwillingness even to entertain a discussion has cost the Bothell Democrat credibility. Santos's hearing on the bill offers hope that it could survive in the House.