California case challenges teacher job protection laws

By Dana Feldman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Incompetent teachers in California are holding back poor and minority children, an attorney for several students said on Thursday in closing arguments for a closely watched trial that could change the way public school teachers are hired and fired in the most populous U.S. state. The two-month trial has focused on whether five laws meant to protect teachers’ jobs are unfair to poor and minority students by putting them at a disproportionately greater risk of being taught by less effective teachers. But the group’s approach also brings in the novel argument that the five laws they are challenging violate the civil rights of students. “We’re asking the court to declare that these five education codes are unconstitutional and that they violate the equal protection clause,” Marcellus A. McRae, one of several attorneys arguing on behalf of plaintiffs, told Reuters.