Court of Appeals sides with Education Minnesota member with prior charter school service in continuing contract dispute
By Paula Johnston, Education Minnesota Attorney
This Legal Briefs column, written by Education Minnesota attorneys, is one of an occasional series on legal developments that affect educators.
On April 28, 2025, Minnesota Court of Appeals issued a great decision in Bellamy v. ISD No. 700, Hermantown Public Schools. The case concerned a 2023 amendment to a continuing contract law which includes previous teaching experience in charter schools and other states when determining the probationary period. The amendment states that:
“[n]otwithstanding any law to the contrary, a teacher who has taught for three consecutive years in a single school district or single charter school in Minnesota or another state must serve a probationary period of no longer than one year in a Minnesota school district.” The Legislature stated that the amendment applied to “collective bargaining agreements effective July 1, 2023.”
While the amendment benefits all teachers, it was part of a larger package of legislative amendments aimed at recruiting and retaining more educators of color to reflect the growing diversity of Minnesota’s student population. By crediting experience in charter schools and schools in other states, which have comparatively higher percentages of educators of color, the 2023 amendment gave educators with these prior experiences the same employment rights as educators with three consecutive years in Minnesota public schools.
In Bellamy, our client had been a speech-language pathologist for more than five consecutive years in a Minnesota charter school before she was hired by the Hermantown school district for the 2022-23 school year. She was a zealous advocate for her students and worked hard to ensure that special education standards were being met in the district. However, the district non-renewed her in June 2024 after her second year with the district.
Education Minnesota appealed the district’s purported non-renewal of our client’s employment contract to the
Minnesota Court of Appeals. A central issue in the case was when the legislative change took effect. The court agreed with our argument that the amendment to 122A.40 was effective on July 1, 2023, and not on the date of the contract ratification the following February, as argued by the district. The court found that the amendment’s effective date is “unambiguously stated” for collective bargaining agreements effective July 1, 2023, and thereafter, and that the school district had a collective bargaining agreement with its teachers effective on July 1, 2023. It went on to state that “[a]s the school district concedes, Minnesota law provides that the prior collective bargaining agreement remains in effect during negotiations,” and that the 2023-25 collective bargaining agreement that was finalized in February 2024 “expressly provides that it was effective as of July 1, 2023, since the contract ratification was retroactive to July 1.”
The court also agreed that because our client had completed both requirements of the amendment’s new language – 1. teaching for three consecutive years in a single school district or single charter school in Minnesota or another state and 2. completing a probationary period of no longer than one year in a Minnesota school district – she attained continuing contract status on July 1, 2023. The court rejected the district’s argument that the one-year probationary term must be served after the effective date of the amendment. Education Minnesota successfully argued that the district’s argument would, in fact, require a probationary period of longer than one year.
Finally, the court agreed that granting our client continuing contract status on July 1, 2023, did not result in a retroactive application of the statute. There is a presumption in the law that statutes do not apply retroactively unless the Legislature clearly states otherwise. In this case, however, the amendment affected the school district’s right not to renew Bellamy’s contract in 2024, after the effective date of the amendment.
Because our client had more than three consecutive years of teaching experience at a charter school and served a probationary period in the district from 2022- 23, she already had a continuing contract effective July 1, 2023, and as a result, the district’s attempt to non-renew her in June of 2024 was invalid. Bellamy herself credits “the unwavering support of Education Minnesota and the incredible efforts of our local union president (Katie Marciniak)” for the outcome in this case.
What this decision means for other members:
- This decision makes clear that the law’s effective date does not require the out-of-state or charter school service or the one-year probationary period to have occurred after July 1, 2023, contrary to what some districts have argued.
- Licensed educators with at least three previous years of consecutive out-of-state or charter school teaching experience who served a probationary period in a Minnesota school district in 2022-23 or 2023-24 without being non-renewed have continuing contract status and cannot be non-renewed this school
- Licensed educators with at least three previous years of consecutive out-of-state or charter school teaching experience who began teaching in the 2024-2025 school year (and teach at least 90 days during the year), and are not non-renewed prior to July 1, 2025, will attain continuing contract status on July 1,
- If you or a member you know are currently in your second or third year in a district and have been non-renewed in the past 60 calendar days despite having the requisite out-of-state or charter school experience, please contact your Education Minnesota field staff as soon as possible so we can help protect their rights.
As a benefit of membership, Education Minnesota’s legal department provides individual legal representation, when needed. In cases of individual statutory rights, such as continuing contract rights, we represent the individual member instead of the local – although the local supported Ms. Bellamy in this case. This differs from contract grievance cases, where we represent the local union challenging the contract violation, even if the grievance currently only affects one person.
Members who believe they need legal representation in an individual rights issue should reach out to their local president or field staff to discuss setting up a legal consultation. For Education Minnesota to provide individual legal representation, the case must meet the requirements of our legal services policy and the person seeking assistance must be an active member at the time the need for representation arises.
