By Ben Velderman
EAGnews.org

NEW YORK – The mayor of America’s largest city has the power to ban Big Gulps and other super-sized sugary drinks, but he lacks the authority to fire inept and ineffective teachers from the city’s worst-performing schools.

That’s the conclusion some observers are drawing from yesterday’s court ruling that temporarily upholds an arbitrator’s decision that  school officials must rehire teachers and administrators who had been sacked as part of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s attempt to “turn around” 24 failing schools.

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Two weeks ago, an arbitrator determined that the city violated the terms of its teacher union contract when it closed down the struggling schools and immediately reopened them with a number of new teachers and administrators. The arbitrator ruled that the city must immediately reinstate these school employees to their former positions.

The city is appealing the ruling, but yesterday New York Supreme Court Judge Joan Lobis declined to suspend the arbitrator’s “re-hire” edict while she hears the appeal.

Lobis refused to issue an injunction on the grounds that rehiring the teachers – if only temporarily – would not cause “irreparable harm” to the city.

“Maybe you’d have to rescind some letters. How is that irreparable harm?” Lobis asked, according to GothamSchools.org.

Lobis is missing the point – it’s the students who are at risk of being harmed by having these adults return to the classroom or the front office. These are the very employees responsible for creating such lousy schools in the first place.

It’s worth remembering that Bloomberg didn’t just randomly pick these 24 schools out of a hat. The schools were chosen because they have been deemed to be “persistently low achieving.” That means they have low proficiency rates in math and English, a lack of progress in boosting student test scores, and graduation rates that are below 60 percent.

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Is that not the very definition of “irreparable harm”?

There is still an off-chance that the lousy teachers and administrators will ultimately be “re-fired,” but observers say Lobis’ refusal to issue an injunction is an indication the city will likely lose its appeal, reports GothamSchools.org.

Welcome to New York City, where Big Gulps are outlawed and the dregs of the teaching profession are guaranteed lifetime jobs.

What a travesty.