NYC Weighs Seniority vs. Merit as Layoffs Loom

Teachers in New York City have a lot of questions on their minds these days: How many, if any, will be laid off? And which set of criteria will be used to make the tough call—the seniority provisions as currently required in state law or one of several revisions now floating around the Statehouse in Albany?

The jobs of up to 4,600 teachers—about 6 percent of the city’s teaching force—as well as others in districts across the state, hang on the answers.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has said those cuts are necessary to plug a spending gap exacerbated by a proposed reduction of $1.4 billion in state aid to the city in the governor’s budget proposal for the 2012 fiscal year. And the mayor has urged the state legislature to allow the city to let go of teachers with “unsatisfactory” evaluation ratings before other teachers. State law currently requires...