Minneapolis Public Schools face lawsuit over provision in teachers' contract
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Minneapolis Public Schools are being sued over a provision in their new contract with teachers that is designed to retain teachers of color. The provision upends long-standing last-in, first-out hiring practices for teachers.
The conservative group Judicial Watch contends the so-called “racial and ethnic preference” provision, along with the use of taxpayer dollars to implement them, are illegal.
MPR News host Cathy Wurzer spoke with Beth Hawkins, a Twin Cities-based education journalist who writes for the education news site The 74.
The following transcript has been edited for length and clarity. Click the audio player above to listen to their conversation.
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What's the language of the contract that some folks are taking issue with?
The specific language says that if a teacher is excessed or laid off and they are a member of a population underrepresented among licensed teachers at that site, or in the district, the district shall excess or lay off the next least-senior teacher who is not a member of an underrepresented population. And it specifically points out that the reason for this is to address past discrimination and further advance diversifying the district's workforce.
Was this an issue for teachers during the strike?
It's been an issue going back several years. The district and the union had gone round and round over various years about what language would be fair to the largest number of teachers and yet would meet the district's goal of having a teacher core and principal core that more closely reflects the population of students in the district.
This year, there were a number of proposals traded back and forth, some of them had to do with the population of neighborhoods around an individual school site. Some of them had to do with teachers from historically Black colleges and universities or tribal colleges. There were a number of attempts to craft language that would stand judicial challenge.
So this language basically upends the last-in, first-out hiring practices that we've seen for decades.
It does. There are a couple of things that are important to note about that. One is that last-in, first-out still exists for the vast majority of teachers and that this contract provision would go away if the teacher core came to resemble the population of the district as a whole. It's also language that's very close to language that some other Twin Cities area school districts have used.
Robbinsdale, for instance, has had a provision like this for several years. Osseo has a slightly different mechanism. They grant some seniority to brand new teachers so that they are less at risk of being probationary at layoff time.
And then the other thing that's really important to note is that if you take the idea of demographic representation out of the mix, Minneapolis has long had some what they call memoranda of agreements to the contract that preserve particular types of teachers.
For instance, for Montessori teachers, it's a very specific kind of teacher training that someone goes through to get that license. And in the service of the fact that teachers are not widgets — and you can't take a person without the training and put them into an open position in a Montessori school — there are some long-standing agreements about teachers who will not be laid off in last-in, first-out order.
Why is the outrage bubbling up now?
It was actually agreed to at the end of March, and there was some there were some new stories at that point about whether it would survive a legal challenge, but no legal challenge emerged. Last week a local right-wing news site called Alpha News published a story about it that didn't actually quote or identify anybody complaining about it.
The story sort of appeared organically that Minneapolis had done this thing and quoted a lawyer from a law firm regarding large freedom of information requests lodged against districts throughout Minnesota.
The suit that was filed yesterday doesn't have as its plaintiff a teacher. One argument is that no one has been harmed by this policy or by this contract provision, yet instead, it was filed by Deborah Jane Clapp, who identifies as a Minneapolis resident since 2017. Under a common law provision, her complaint gives her standing to sue because of the unlawful expenditure of public money or illegal action on the part of public officials. It's a discrimination claim without a victim.
Say more about Judicial Watch, the group that filed the suit.
Judicial Watch is based elsewhere and has pursued legal action, for instance, in pursuit of the idea that climate science is what they call fraud science. They've been involved in any number of legal actions involving Hillary Clinton. Just a long, long, long list of things that have been raging controversies in the news.
In terms of the legalities, you mentioned that this contract was crafted to withstand legal challenges. What else is Judicial Watch saying about why this is illegal?
There's not much documentation. What it asserts is that because Ms. Clapp is a taxpayer in Minneapolis in Hennepin County and that her property taxes go to Minneapolis Public Schools — which is of course true — and that as such, she loses when layoffs occur. And what she's asserted is that this layoff process is discriminatory.
I'm not a lawyer, and or much less a judge. But I think that's a pretty steep hill to climb. If you were to look at the district's payroll, I think that if we're talking about protecting teachers who are less senior from layoffs, it's going to be pretty hard to argue that any Minneapolis resident is losing money under this contract.
What is the district saying about the lawsuit?
What the district has said about the lawsuit is that they can't comment on pending legal actions. What they said during the teacher strike negotiations — and even going back as far as 2017 and 2018 — is that they need various mechanisms to make their Teacher Corps look more like the student population.
There's just an avalanche, a mountain of evidence that shows that this is something that children of color desperately need to be successful academically and behaviorally in their schools. And that without the ability to protect teachers who are newly hired from the constant churn, it would take decades to have a Teacher Corps that reflects the student population.
If you really want to go into the Wayback Machine, the courts ordered Minneapolis Public Schools to desegregate in 1972. And in 1978, the district went to the court and said, “We can't achieve this in terms of the segregation of our Teacher Corps if we can't make a side agreement protecting some teachers of color.”
How far off is the district from achieving its goal?
In Minnesota, 5 percent of teachers — it's a number that goes up and down by one percent yearly and has for a long time — are non-white, and the rest are white. In Minneapolis it's 18 percent. Minneapolis has gone out and intentionally recruited and hired and attempted to improve working conditions for staff of color. However, the percentage of those teachers who are probationary is much higher than white teachers in 2020.
For example, 23 percent of the district's white Teacher Corps was probationary, and 37 percent of its teachers of color were probationary. And those teachers of course have no protection against excessing and layoffs at all. This last spring, before a second round of budget cuts were announced, 50 BIPOC teachers were excessed in Minneapolis Public Schools. So the protections won't kick in until the spring of 2023. It's dozens of teachers a year.
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Audio transcript
The district and teachers' union say the goal of the provision is to make sure the teaching staff reflects the district, where more than 60% are students of color. We wanted to know more about this controversy, so we've called Beth Hawkins. Beth is a Twin Cities-based education journalist who writes for the education journalism news website called the74million.org. Hey, Beth. How are you?
BETH HAWKINS: I'm good, Cathy. Thanks for the invitation.
CATHY WURZER: And thanks for joining us. Well, this language included in the new contract, that ended the teacher strike earlier this year, right? What's the specific language in the contract that has some folks taking issue with it?
BETH HAWKINS: So the specific language says that if a teacher is excessed or laid off and they're a member of a population underrepresented among licensed teachers at that site or in the district, the district shall excess or layoff the next least senior teacher who is not a member of an underrepresented population. And it specifically points out that the reason for this is to address past discrimination and in furtherance of diversifying the district's workforce.
CATHY WURZER: I'm trying to remember, during the teacher strike, was this an issue for teachers?
BETH HAWKINS: It's been an issue going back several years. The district and the union had gone round and round over various years about what language would be fair to the largest number of teachers and yet would meet the district's goal of having a teacher and principal corps that more closely reflects the population of students in the district.
This year, there were a number of proposals traded back and forth. Some of them had to do with the population of the neighborhoods around an individual school site. Some of them had to do with teachers from historically Black colleges and universities or tribal colleges. There were a number of attempts to craft language that would stand judicial challenge.
CATHY WURZER: So, as I mentioned in the intro, this language basically upends the "last in, first out" hiring practices that we've seen for decades.
BETH HAWKINS: It does. There are a couple of things that are important to note about that. One is that "last in, first out" still exists for the vast majority of teachers and that this contract provision would go away if the teacher corps came to resemble the population of the district as a whole. It's also language that's very close to language that some other Twin Cities area school districts have used. Robbinsdale, for instance, has had a provision like this for several years. Osseo has a slightly different mechanism. They grant some seniority to brand-new teachers so that they are less at risk of being probationary at layoff time.
And then the other thing that's really important to note is that if you take the idea of demographic representation out of the mix, Minneapolis has long had some what they call memoranda of agreements to the contract that preserve particular types of teachers. For instance, Montessori teachers. It's a very specific kind of teacher training that someone goes through to get that license. And in the service of the fact that teachers are not widgets, and you can't take a person without their training and put them into an open position in a Montessori school, there are some long-standing agreements about teachers who will not be laid off in "last in, first out" order.
CATHY WURZER: So the contract was agreed to in May. So it's been out there for a while. So why is the outrage bubbling up on this now?
BETH HAWKINS: Yeah. So it was actually agreed to at the end of March. And there were some news stories at that point about whether it would survive a legal challenge, but no legal challenge emerged. Last week, a local right-wing news site called Alpha News published a story about it that didn't actually quote or identify anybody complaining about it. The story sort of appeared organically, that Minneapolis had done this thing and quoted a lawyer from a law firm that you and I have talked about in the past, Cathy, regarding large freedom of information requests lodged against districts throughout Minnesota, saying that here was his contact information if anybody wished to become a plaintiff in this suit.
The suit that was filed yesterday doesn't have as its plaintiff a teacher, so one argument is that no one has been harmed by this policy or by this contract provision yet. Instead, it was filed by Deborah Jane Clapp, who identifies as a Minneapolis resident since 2017, under a common law provision that her complaint says gives her standing to sue because of the unlawful expenditure of public money or illegal action on the part of public officials. So it's a discrimination claim without a victim.
CATHY WURZER: And the group is Judicial Watch, I understand, who filed the suit?
BETH HAWKINS: Yes. Yes. Judicial Watch is based elsewhere and has pursued legal action, for instance, in pursuit of the idea that climate science is what they call fraud science. They've been involved in any number of legal actions involving Hillary Clinton. Just a long, long, long list of things that have been raging controversies in the news.
CATHY WURZER: So in terms of the legalities, you mentioned that this contract was crafted to withstand legal challenges. So what else is legal Judicial Watch is saying about the wisest illegal, do they think?
BETH HAWKINS: Well, it's not a long complaint, Cathy, which is interesting to me, and there's not much documentation. What it asserts is that because Ms. Clapp is a taxpayer in Minneapolis and Hennepin County, that her property taxes go to Minneapolis Public Schools, which is, of course, true, and that as such, she loses when layoffs occur. And what she's asserted is that this layoff process is discriminatory.
I'm not a lawyer, much less a judge, but I think that's a pretty steep hill to climb. If you were to look at the district's payroll, I think that if we're talking about protecting teachers who are less senior from layoff, it's going to be pretty hard to argue that any Minneapolis resident is losing money under this contract.
CATHY WURZER: What's the district saying about the lawsuit?
BETH HAWKINS: What the district has said about the lawsuit is that they can't comment on pending legal actions. What they said during the teacher strike negotiations, and even going back as far as 2017 and 2018, is that they need various mechanisms to make their teacher corps look more like the student population. There's just an avalanche, a mountain of evidence that shows that this is something that children of color desperately need to be successful academically and behaviorally in their schools, and that without the ability to protect teachers who are newly hired from constant churn, it would take decades to have a teacher corps that reflects the student population.
And indeed, if you if you really want to go into the Wayback Machine, the courts ordered Minneapolis Public Schools to desegregate in 1972. And in 1978, the district went to the court and said, we can't achieve this in terms of the segregation of our teacher corps if we can't make a side agreement protecting some teachers of color.
CATHY WURZER: By the way, how far off is the district from achieving its goal? I believe I said 60% of the student body are BIPOC kids.
BETH HAWKINS: Yes. Yes. So in Minnesota, 5% of teachers-- it's a number that goes up and down by 1% yearly for a long time-- are teachers color, are non-white, and the rest are white. In Minneapolis, it's 18%. So Minneapolis has gone out and intentionally recruited and hired and attempted to improve working conditions for staff of color. However, the percentage of those teachers who are probationary is much higher than white teachers.
In 2020, for example, 23% of the district's white teacher corps was probationary, and 37% of its teachers of color were probationary. And those teachers, of course, have no protection against excessing and layoff at all. This last spring, before a second round of budget cuts were announced, 50 BIPOC teachers were excessed in Minneapolis Public Schools, and the protections won't kick in until the spring of 2023. So it's dozens of teachers a year.
CATHY WURZER: All right. Beth, thank you for the background. We appreciate it.
BETH HAWKINS: It's always fun to be with you, Cathy.
CATHY WURZER: Likewise. Thanks, Beth. Beth Hawkins is a Twin Cities-based education journalist who writes for the education journalism news website called the74million.org
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