C-30 Procedure
C-30 – Pedagogical Personnel
At 39 pages, including its attached forms and the “do’s and don’ts of
interviewing,” this is one of the longer regulations. It governs the
selection of
principals and assistant principals. The so-called “C-30 process” is
supposed to
give parents and teachers input into who runs their schools.
Filling any empty position requires two pieces of information: who is
available
and who is the best choice? The C-30 Regulation doesn’t help much with
the
first part. The 5 most-senior candidates within the district must be
considered,
plus others who are interested. (Crossing district lines is a separate
process,
governed by labor contracts.)
Regulation C-30 requires not one, but two committees to review
applications.
The Level 1 and Level 2 committees don’t get to pick who they
interview, though.
The Level 1 committee must review the five most senior applicants, plus
any
others, and report its findings to the Level 2 committee. That
committee, which
consists of regional or central administrators, makes the final
decision.
Membership in the Level 1 committee varies, depending on who’s being
hired. It
usually has a principal or other administrator, two UFT members, one
“school
support” person and between four and seven parents. The parents can be
left
off, which is one reason why parents feel shut out of the hiring
process.
Decisions by outsiders are rarely good decisions. A good example would
be
forcing principals to accept assistant principals who they don’t want
to work with.
For that reason, Chancellor Klein amended the Regulation so that
principals
have the final say in hiring their assistant principals. That makes
sense. The
principal’s union, however, objected to giving principals the right to
make
decisions, and brought a grievance before the PERB.
It’s still pending, more
than two years later.
Is this a good way to do hiring at a school? It might be, if it were
quick, or if it
avoided fights, or if the decisions were final. Unfortunately, it is
none of those
things. Principals and assistant principals have contractual seniority
rights, so
the whole C-30 procedure can sometimes be skipped or thrown out later.
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The Chancellor’s Regulations For Parents
decisions aren’t final, either. Anyone can complain to the Chancellor
about the
C-30 process, and the Chancellor must make an “appropriate
investigation” and
issue a written decision within 20 days. Even after that,
administrators and UFT
members have the right to file grievances that can undo the hiring
decision,
perhaps months after it was made.