Here’s a couple of excerpts from New Jersey School Boards Association’s testimony to the Senate Education Committee yesterday on Sen. Teresa Ruiz’s tenure reform bill.

NJSBA which, for more than 35 years, has called for the elimination of the current system of tenure for teachers and other instructional staff, supports S-14555…because it represents a move towards improved accountability and management of the instructional program.

On the recent change to the bill that would eliminate LIFO for only newly-hired staff:

We believe however that these changes must apply to existing staff as well…NJSBA believes that elimination of the lastin-first out seniority process for new employees, as reflected in section 23 of the bill, should apply to all teaching staff upon the bill’s effective date.

For the record, NJSBA has long-standing policy in support of the complete elimination of tenure in favor of three-five year, renewable contracts. NJSBA believes that the outdated life-time tenure system for teachers should be replaced by a statutory system of renewable contracts…