California Teachers Ass'n v. Governing Board of Golden Valley Unified School District

The California Teachers Association (CTA) and Tiffani Curran (Curran) filed a petition for a peremptory writ of mandate after Curran was informed in a letter dated August 3, 1999, that she would not be employed as a teacher by the Golden Valley Unified School District (Golden Valley) for the 1999-2000 school year. The trial court denied the petition and ruled a teacher with only an emergency permit may not be classified as a probationary employee and, therefore, the statutory procedures of notice and a hearing do not apply to the dismissal of such a teacher.

Curran appealed, contending (1) she was a probationary employee during the 1998-1999 school year who was not given a nonreelection notice under Education Code section 44929.21 and, therefore, was automatically rehired for the following school year; (2) by virtue of her written contract with Golden Valley classifying her as a probationary employee, she was entitled to the statutory procedures applicable to the dismissal of probationary employees; (3) if, alternatively, she should have been classified as a temporary employee instead of a probationary employee, Golden Valley was required to follow the statutory…