A bill approved by the Labor and Public Employees Committee will make it more difficult for boards of education to terminate tenured teachers by mandating a ‘just cause” provision for teachers in state statute and requiring a neutral arbitrator determine whether the teacher should be fired, which the state’s largest teachers’ union argues will protect teachers from politically motivated discipline.
Unlike most state and municipal employees who are part of a union, discipline for teachers is governed by state statute rather than a collective bargaining agreement. Long-standing current law allows a teacher to be terminated by a board of education for inefficiency and incompetence, insubordination, moral misconduct, disability proven by medical evidence, elimination of a position, and for “due and sufficient cause,” according to an Office of Legislative Research (OLR) report.
Senate Bill 1371, however, would replace “due and sufficient cause,” – which appears to have a vague definition – with “just cause,” a standard applied to most other unionized state and local employees that requires employers prove the employee was appropriately warned, received a fair investigation, received equal treatment and an appropriate level of discipline. The bill would also require a neutral arbitrator to determine whether the teacher should be terminated rather than issuing a recommendation to the board, as currently allowed under state statute.
CEA President Kate Dias wrote in testimony that the just cause standard “ensures the process is fair, any resulting discipline is proportionate, and that appropriate consideration is given to past events.”
“There is a growing number of teachers who have faced termination when their exercise of free speech online became ignited by social media,” Dias wrote. “As a result, and because of the unfair and politicized process, these teachers end up resigning and even leaving the profession.”
In November of 2024, following the presidential election, a Cheshire public school teacher resigned after video of her threatening anyone who voted for Donald Trump was posted to X and resulted in the school being inundated with calls and messages. A long-time New Britain teacher placed on leave after she refused to remove a crucifix from her desk area. An Enfield teacher who had a Black Lives Matter flag in his classroom ignited recent debate during a town council meeting.
In 2022, a teacher at Westport’s Green Farms Academy was terminated after he was caught on undercover camera making sexualized comments about his students and the video was posted online.
“Increasingly, decisions to terminate a teacher are driven by politics, not justice,” Dias wrote. “The result is good teachers leaving the classroom and new and aspiring educators seeking different career paths.”
Dr. Jason Scavotto, a teacher in Manchester’s high school, wrote in testimony that at a previous job he was asked by an assistant principal to “promote diversity initiatives within the school,” and after doing so, he was brought into the principal’s office and threatened with termination for “undermining the superintendent of schools by pursuing diversity work in the school.”
“I had violated no stated policy. I had acted in compliance with a direct superior’s request. I had not endangered anyone; if anything, this work provided a greater sense of security for children who often don’t feel safe,” Scavotto wrote. “And yet, I was at risk of being terminated… So, I made the decision to resign.”
The bill received overwhelming support from other teachers who testified but was opposed by the State Department of Education (CSDE), the Connecticut Association of Public School Superintendents (CAPSS), and the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education (CABE), who argued it would remove decision-making authority from local boards of education, and that “just cause” is an inappropriate standard because of the protections already guaranteed in state statute.
“Raised Bill No. 1371 would deprive boards of education of the ability to establish standards for teachers to remain in employment in their communities because the determination of the hearing officer would be binding on them. Moreover, while a teacher would retain the right to appeal a bad decision, boards of education could not do so,” CAPSS and CABE wrote in joint testimony.
CSDE Commissioner Charlene Tucker-Russell wrote she didn’t believe implementing “just cause” would be a substantive change but did raise concerns over allowing an arbitrator to determine terminations, saying it would “give the arbitrator the unilateral power to determine discipline and the board of education would be bound by it.”
“This would remove the right of local and regional school boards to make the fundamental determination as to the qualifications of individuals who teach in their systems and interact with their students,” Tucker-Russell wrote. “Implicit in that is the right of a board to determine who it does not wish to employ.”
Failure by state agencies and municipalities to adhere to just cause provisions in the past has resulted in terminated employees getting their jobs back, often with hefty payouts for lost wages.
During a March 13 vote to pass the bill out of committee, Republican lawmakers voted against the change, arguing that it removed local control from boards of education.
“The fact of the matter is teachers are already granted protections, partly because they exist in our state statute, and partly because they have the protection of a labor union, so they are already at a distinct advantage when it comes to negotiating their employment and potential termination,” Sen. Rob Sampson, R-Wolcott, said. “The idea that somehow a single administrator could just fire a teacher for looking at them sideways or some other anecdotal commentary is just not accurate. The fact of the matter is that decision is made by multiple people, it’s going to be reviewed by multiple people and it will be brought into the public light.”
“Here in Connecticut, I think we place a high value on local control,” Rep. Joe Canino, R-Torrington, said during discussion. “We have boards of education for a reason and that reason is we want to give our constituents the ability to choose the individuals who create the teaching landscape in their community and chief among those decisions is who will be teaching those children.”
“The standard in nearly every municipal and public employee collective bargaining agreement is just cause,” wrote James Demetriades, an attorney for Ferguson, Doyle and Chester, which represents the Connecticut Chapter of the American Federation of Teachers. “Every staff member in a school other than the teachers are subject to stronger protections against termination. As someone who has arbitrated multiple cases the requirement that a district prove Just Cause is vital to fundamental fairness and due process.”
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They want to protect teachers who threaten violence against people with different political views, and teachers who want to sexually abuse their students.
Sick….they need to fire more black teachers and principals that keep their minority students at the bottom of the barrel….you know the school to prison pipeline.
Won’t this create yet another class of entitled and untouchable workers?
The fact that this bill is opposed by the 3 most effective groups supporting public education in CT (CSDE, CAPSS, CABE) and only supported by a bureaucratic arm of the DOE says a lot. How this made it out of committee is shameful – and how it was only PUBLICLY opposed by Republicans when the majority members of all 3 opposing organizations are Democrats is baffling. Call your reps!