Welcome to the Teachers Need Teachers podcast, where we help new and beginning teachers
navigate through those crazy first years of teaching so you can maintain your sanity and
personal life. Here's your host, him Lapree. Welcome to the Teachers Need
Teachers Podcasts, the podcast for teachers that don't want to just survive teaching,
but actually thrive. I'm really glad that you guys are here today because today
I'm movie talking about notices of non renewal, which is a really hard topic
to discuss because, let's face it, no one likes to get laid off
or let go, and it's truly painful. It can feel really shameful depending
on why you're getting let go, and it can be a really scary time.
I think one of the things that I can do in terms of helping
you is just giving you information on what your options are. I can't necessarily
tell you what to do next, but I think that being informed can really
help you know whether or not you're making the right decisions moving forward. So
in today's episode, I am going to talk not only about what to do
when you get the non renewal, but what your options are. So what
is a notice of non renewal. It basically means that your contract isn't going
to be renewed for the falling school year, and this can happen for a
number of reasons. It could be based on performance, it could be based
on budget cuts or reduce in personnel. There's actually a lot of different reasons
why administrators will issue a notice of non renewal. So before you take any
action, the main thing that you want to do upon receiving this notice is
to review it carefully. You want to understand the reasons for why this was
issued to you, make sure that the reasons align with the terms of the
contract that you signed when you got the job, and that those reasons are
actually valid. And if you have any questions or concerns of about those reasons,
then be sure to get clarification from human resources from your administrator, and
then if you have one a union, you definitely want to also ask for
specific evidence for examples for the non renewal, especially if it is performance based.
So once you've explored the reasons as to why you've got that, one
of the first things that you can do is to request a hearing. In
most states, teachers that receive a notice of a non renewal can request a
hearing before an independent hearing officer. So the independent hearing officer will review the
notice and the evidence and they'll make a recommendation to the school board, and
from there, the school board can determine whether or not to go through with
the non renewal. Now, this next option depends on whether or not you
have a union. If you do have an union, then you can file
agreevance. If you believe that the non renewal is unjust, then you're going
to want to consider challenging this by going through your district's grievance process. So
this might involve filing a formal complaint and presenting evidence to support your claim.
And if you are part of a union, they're most likely going to be
helping you out with this and giving you additional resources. The union can also
do their own investigation and file their own complaint on your behalf if they believe
that the non renewal is unwarranted, and then the school district will have an
opportunity to respond to this complaint, and if the union is not satisfied with
that response, then they can also bacuate up in terms of filing a lawsuit
against the district. Now, if here's the thing, if you work in
what's called a right to work state, then that means that teachers have fewer
rights and most likely you don't have union representation, and even if you did
have union representation, it's probably not very strong or it's not really going to
help you out in this case, and right to work states teachers aren't even
required to join unions, and so if you're not part of the union,
you might not have any support. It also means that you're probably not going
to have the same rights to bile a grievance as you would if you weren't
living in a right to work state, and so you'll have fewer options,
include a you might not even have the option to have a hearing. Also,
this grievance process depends on whether or not you work at a private,
a charter, or a public school, So teachers that work in private schools
tend to not have any options or anyone to support or grieve this process.
You're going to have pewer rights because you're not governed by a district that is
being run with public funds. It's a privately funded school, and so the
administrators can hire and fire at will. On the other hand, public school
teachers tend to have more options because they are being paid by public funds by
a lot of times by taxes and things like that, and so that gives
you more protection in that case, but if you don't have a union,
it's still not necessarily going to help keep your job. Charter schools are a
little bit more like public schools and that they are also publicly funded, but
a lot of times the way that they have their contracts, they're not necessarily
long term contracts. You might actually on a year to year fasis, and
so if a non renewal might become kind of a regular thing. So if
you do decide to stay with a charter school or apply to a charter school,
I would definitely check the contract to see what is the process for becoming
tenured or if you even have an option to be tenured there. I've actually
read of instances of teachers and private and charter schools where their contracts are a
year to year, and a lot of times those schools just like to get
rid of teachers after a certain amount of time because it's easier to not keep
you past a certain number of years. Let's say four or five years where
you become ten yured or permanent. So they just like to keep the turret
over so they're not stuck with any teacher for an indefinite amount of time.
So your third option is to actually find a job somewhere else. So if
you are non renewed, you can consider teaching at another district at another school.
Maybe maybe it's just you got a non renewal from that one school and
you can apply to a different school, or maybe you just want to teach
in another state at all. Together. From what I've heard from other teachers
who were see if this non renewal, notice they kind of just don't even
want to finish up the school year. They're at a point where it's just
they're so bitter about getting this in the first place because a lot of times
the reasons that they're getting it they don't agree with. So if your administrator
puts performance reasons and you're looking at this and you have no way of defending
yourself, it makes you not even want to stay there till the school year.
Now, I really caution you against leaving in the middle of the year
if you get this non renewal and you want to keep on teaching because it'll
definitely hurt your chances of getting a job at a different school. However,
even if you do fight this non renewal and you win, you're still going
to be in the school, probably with the same administrator, and that can
make it really hard to want to stay. You're always going to be wondering
if that principle is going to be fighting reasons to get rid of you again.
So an option is definitely to just look elsewhere for an appointment. So
obviously this is going to mean updating your resume, getting letters of recommendation from
your colleagues or administrators that you've had in the past that do have a favorable
opinion of you. If you're a new teacher, you can get letters of
recommendation from the professors where you've got your teaching credential, wherever your teaching training
program was at. But basically, you want to network and you want to
look for other job opportunities as soon as you get this renewal notice or of
grieving the process or getting a hearing is unsuccessful. So a big consideration that
a lot of teachers are growtling with when they get this notice of non renewal
is whether or not they should accept it or if they should just resign.
So this means that if you accept it, that the non renewal is going
to be on your record, as opposed to resigning where you kind of got
in before the chance of that non renewal to hit your record. In fact,
I've definitely heard of some administrators suggesting to teachers that they just resign so
they can avoid getting the non renewal. Now, whether or not you do
one or the other depends on several factors, and this includes the reason for
the non renewal, what your career goals are, and of course your financial
situation. Now, one reason why you might want to accept the non renewal
is because maybe the reasons that they gave you are valid. Maybe they are
valid, and it's going to be really hard to fight it or really hard
to win if you were to crieve this case. So if you're not going
to be successful with this challenging decision, then accepting it might be the best
decision for you, and then you just start looking for a new job.
Some teachers are afraid that having that non renewal on their record is going to
hurt them from getting another job. But it just really depends on why you
got the non renewal, and accepting the non renewal if you already were going
to lead, could be a good option and just also just sort of motivate
you to go. Another reason why people would want to accept a non renewal
is because it allows them to apply for unemployment benefits. In terms of how
to get those unemployment benefits, you need to look that up in your particular
or state or county or city. But accepting the non renewal is almost like
getting laid off, so it makes it easier for you to get the unemployment
benefits. So resigning well pretty much keep that non renewal from ever showing up
on your record, because sometimes districts will do background checks or they'll go back
to the school that you taught up previously and ask questions. And so if
you don't want that to go out that you've got a non renewal, then
formally resigning could be your best option, especially if you want to continue teaching.
Sometimes teachers look at a negative performance evaluation from a particularly hostile administrator,
or they're just in a situation where they never even really had a chance because
the administrators seem to have it out for them to just formally resigning could give
them the kind of fresh start that they need for when they're applying to a
new school. However, it's also the opposite of taking that non renewal,
and that once you resign, you can't file for unemployment, and so that's
a financial decision that you need to consider if you need that unemployment to hold
you over until you get another job. So obviously this is a really,
really tough time right now because you're faced with this feeling of rejection and a
lot of times it just feels so unfair. So even if you get a
non renewal because there's going to be lower enrollment the following year so they're letting
go of teachers or for financial reasons, it's still really like a punch in
the gut when you get this notice. So at this point I would definitely
seek out support from other teachers who are going through the same process and who
have gone through this before. You can go onto Facebook groups, and they
have Facebook groups specifically for teachers who've gotten no renewals. There are also Reddit
sub groups like the ones just for It's just Reddit for teachers. They have
a lot of support for teachers who received a non renewal, but right now
is a time to surround yourself with other supportive colleagues who've been through it before,
and even your colleagues who haven't been for it before, they can definitely
support you. But it just feels really good to talk to someone who's been
through it so that they can commits right with you and give you advice on
what to do next. I can't give you specific advice because of the fact
that your situation is different from everybody else's. I don't know what type of
school you teach at, state that you teach at, whether or not you
have an union, things like that. So I would definitely reach out to
other teachers, but use this video and the information that you've got here as
a jumping off point to know ooh, so that you can explore what your
next options are. So I hope that you found that information useful. Definitely
reach out to other teachers, and if you have a union, reach out
to them, and you never know, maybe you have to go and hire
our own lawyers so that you can fight this process. If you did receive
a notice of non renewal, Please reach out to me so I can support
you however I can. You can reach me at Kim at Teachers Need Teachers
dot com. Thanks for being here the speak advice and I will see you
next time. Thanks for listening to the Teachers Need Teachers podcast. Love this
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