GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

In the debate over whether to close 19 schools this year, the city and its opponents have mulled possible effects on student achievement, attendance, and the drop-out rate. But one thing that remains unclear is what will happen to the approximately 1,000 teachers working in these schools.

Teachers who work at shuttered schools lose their positions, but — because of a deliberate line in the labor contract — they do not fall off the city payroll, even if they don’t find a new position at another city school. In the past few years, the contract line has meant a ballooning set of teachers receiving regular paychecks even though they don’t hold regular jobs. Between 2006 and April 2009, these members of the Absent Teacher Reserve cost the DOE approximately $193 million. This year, conservative estimates put the cost at $90 million.

In 2008, a report by The New Teacher Project, a New York-based research group, said the hiring process was “hard-wired for failure.” The report also found that 70 percent of excessed teachers from closing schools in 2007 were immediately hired at other schools.

But the situation next year could look worse.

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