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Newark Weighs Options to Cut Bloated Teacher Ranks
Associated Press | 5/23/12

Behind the Headline
Valuing Teachers
Education Next | Summer 2011

Newark school  leaders, searching for the best way to reduce the number of teachers in order to balance the budget, have raised the possibility of teacher buyouts funded by  the $100 million donation from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg , reports Samantha Henry of the Associated Press. “If we could fire the 300 or 400 lowest-performing teachers, she wouldn’t have a financial crisis,” Newark Mayor Cory Booker said, speaking of the schools superintendent. In an article that appeared in the Summer 2011 issue of Education Next, Eric Hanushek looked at the impact on the future earnings of students, and the U.S. economy as a whole, of identifying and replacing the lowest-performing teachers.