The trinity of teachers’ rights in California – tenure, seniority and
due process in dismissals – will be under attack next week in a trial
in Los Angeles with statewide impact and national interest.
In Vergara v. California, a nonprofit organization, Students Matter,
is suing the state to overturn five statutes in the Education Code on
behalf of Beatriz Vergara, a Los Angeles Unified student who was 13 when
the lawsuit was filed in 2012, and eight more students in five
districts. The laws grant probationary teachers the right to obtain
tenure, or permanent status, after essentially 18 months on the
job, establish layoffs based primarily on seniority and lay out a
dismissal process with complex due process procedures that the
Legislature has tried, but failed, to amend for two years.
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