Under LIFO layoff rules, junior teachers and other employees lose their jobs before senior ones.
LIFO's proponents claim that it protects teachers with tenure and gives them job stability, and that it is an easily administered way of accomplishing layoffs following a budget cut.
LIFO and tenure were originally intended to provide college professors with academic freedom and ensure that they could research topics of their own choosing.
However, in schools where more than 75% of the student body receives Free and Reduced meals, only 77% of the teachers have more than 4 years of experience.
[5] Finally, teachers in high need areas, such as secondary math and special education, are often less experienced due to the difficulty of recruiting these positions, and districts who adhere strictly to seniority based systems for layoffs face the added burden of recruiting teachers in these areas.
Data shows that the VAM based on standardized test scores, is a better indicator of teacher performance than any observable attributes.
[12] Since less experienced teachers typically have lower salaries, it is estimated that if districts in the United States cut 5% of their budget through seniority based layoffs, approximately 79,000 more teachers would lose their jobs versus seniority neutral layoffs.
[14] Starting with Arizona in 2009, certain states and districts have been passing laws which prohibit seniority from being the deciding factor in layoff decisions.
[15] Michelle Rhee, the former Chancellor of Washington, D.C. public schools, opposes the Last in First Out policy, instead suggesting performance based evaluation to determine layoffs.