Shake-Up at Midyear in L.A. Schools to Be Halted

In what teachers and school officials hailed as an important educational advancement, the Los Angeles Unified School District agreed Thursday to forgo a disruptive, 20-year-old mid-school-year practice of reassigning many students and teachers to adjust for enrollment changes.

As part of continuing negotiations for a new labor contract, the district and its 22,000-member teachers’ union signed a special agreement eliminating the midyear shake-up that has traditionally occurred each February in junior and senior high schools.

The pact will mean greater continuity of instruction for tens of thousands students, who otherwise would be forced to make mid-course changes in teachers and classrooms. Those changes had been required to adjust to a traditional falloff in enrollment between the opening of school in September and the end of the year. Last year, for instance, the enrollment in junior and senior high schools dropped 7,457 by midyear.

Able to Cut Costs

Through the midyear shake-up, which can affect almost every student in some schools, the district has been able to cut costs by consolidating and canceling classes and teaching assignments. In the process, many students who were halfway through a full-year academic course, such as algebra, often found themselves shifted to a new teacher in a new class. For teachers, the shake-up would set off a domino effect spreading from subject to subject and school to school.

Abandoning the shake-up, which district officials say will cost an additional $3.9 million, means that most students will be able to stick with one teacher and one class all year, and class sizes generally will be smaller.

“It is incredibly significant,” said Helen Bernstein, a vice president with United Teachers-Los Angeles, which has pushed for the change. The shake-up has been “absurd educationally” and a “complete disruption for students,” she said.

School board President Roberta Weintraub said, “We felt the time had come” to make the change. Recent complaints from both teachers and parents about the “havoc that is wrought” by the midyear shake up persuaded the board to abandon it, she said.

A Matter of Cost

Weintraub said she did not have a immediate explanation why the practice had not been dropped earlier, but other district officials said it was a matter of cost.

“It’s a considerable concession by the district because of the cost,” said Associate Supt. Gabriel Cortina. “But we always thought it was a good idea.”

The agreement is the second major issue to be resolved recently between teachers and the board, even though the two sides remain far apart on a new contract. Two weeks ago, agreement was reached on a plan to allow the state-mandated California Achievement Program test to proceed in the high schools, despite a teacher boycott of some duties. There still is disagreement on such key issues as pay increases.

Bernstein assailed district management for not eliminating the shake-up sooner and strongly disputed the district’s contention that it was somehow a financial concession to teachers.

Negotiations on a full contract are expected to take weeks, possibly months to complete.