Public School Teachers are Precious, But…

As school systems across the country begin another academic year in an impaired economy, there is one huge issue looming over classrooms everywhere. Tenure is a concept that grew out of the university system to encourage professors to embrace the new and controversial without fear of losing their jobs. Since higher education is where the “new next” is often born, from political theory to stem cell research and even broaching the subject of global warming for the first time, tenure was viewed as the academic equivalent of the First Amendment. But the concept of tenure and seniority got mixed up along the way, and unions seized on that high-sounding word as a rallying point for their constituency… feeling that it was intellectually more appealing than calling it “job security.”

Particularly in the fields of public primary and secondary education, where fundamental research and cutting edge writing and experimentation are not relevant – it’s about preparing children for their next steps in life and supplying them with the basics they will need – tenure was simply the wrong concept. Further, there are a whole lot more public school teachers at this level, with fringe benefits and pension plans to match, that the overall burden on society – without the off-setting benefits of the “new next” – is staggering. With somewhere between $1 and $3 trillion in state and local unfunded pension benefits, the pension money owed to “tenured teachers” is a clearly and unsustainably rising debt.

To make matters worse, as we increase class size and allow some unqualified tenured teachers to remain at their post, our public educational system is failing, and we are hardly producing the bevy of prepared students that this country needs to sustain its economic position. If you want to see the numbers, check out my “Unqualified!” March 23^rd blog. The simple headline (from the Department of Education): “‘A recent study [a December 2010 report by the Education Trust entitled Shut Out of the Military: Today’s High School Education Doesn’t Mean You Are Ready for Today’s Army] found that 75% of America’s youth are NOT qualified to join the Armed Forces. This could have serious effects on America’s ability to defend itself.’ Some of this is because of an epidemic of obesity, but most of it is over educational standards.”

In my “Tenuous Tenure” blog on February 24^th, I delved even more deeply into the negative consequences of using this seniority-based tenure concept in public school systems to protect unqualified teachers who simply cannot deliver the educational goods to our children. I discussed that new metrics, which evaluate in-class observation, changes in student performance both on test scores and in subsequent years and apply other objective criteria, that can effectively identify the productive teachers from those who are below par. And I suggested the following paradigm: “Applying the above objective criteria, accord de facto seniority-tenure to any teacher who achieves a top 25^th percentile in two consecutive years or two out of three consecutive years… and implement seniority-tenure forfeiture for any teacher who falls into the bottom 25^th percentile in two consecutive years or two out of three consecutive years. For the rest, seniority-tenure can continue as it currently is. Oh, and for good measure, take away the teaching certificates and right to teach of any teacher who falls into the bottom 5^th percentile in two consecutive years or two out of three consecutive years.”

Whatever else it said, we need pension reform to move to a level that we can actually afford, but we also need to reexamine the entire notion of tenure in our public school system. New York City, under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, has pledged eventually to phase that concept entirely out of his school system. In the meantime, he is requiring performance evaluations in NYC drastically to reduce according tenured status under the current system. “Only 55 percent of eligible teachers, having worked for at least three years, earned tenure in 2012, compared with 97 percent in 2007… An additional 42 percent this year were kept on probation for another year, and 3 percent were denied tenure and fired. Of those whose probations were extended last year, fewer than half won tenure this year, a third were given yet another year to prove themselves, and 16 percent were denied tenure or resigned.” New York Times, August 17^th.

To some liberal thinkers, taking seniority out of the system is unthinkable, but the long-term damage to the lives of students is too catastrophic to be permitted to continue. There are states where the unions have too much power, blocking every attempt to impose accountability and responsibility to a seniority system gone rogue: “The California Teachers Assn. was a key voice in last year's state budget. It has large amounts of cash, and one Democrat says it views itself as ‘the co-equal fourth branch of government.’” Los Angeles Times, August 18^th. California’s fiscal problems are more serious than those of most states, and such inflexible political clout is one of the primary reasons.

My suggestion to restructure the concept of “seniority” noted above protects reasonably-performing teachers while removing those who cannot provide what is needed. While California buries its head in the sand, other states are addressing these issues from an entirely different perspective: “Idaho last year did away with tenure entirely by passing a law giving newly hired teachers no expectation of a contract renewal from one year to the next. In Florida, all newly hired teachers now must earn an annual contract, with renewals based upon their performance… [In July] in New Jersey, Gov. Chris Christie signed legislation overhauling the nation’s oldest tenure law and making it easier for teachers to be fired for poor performance.” NY Times.

In the end, this cannot be a liberal vs. conservative issue – which unfortunately it has become in many jurisdictions. We need balance, but the goals have to be to create a public educational system that serves their children entrusted to its care and the society that they are being prepared to enter at a reasonable and affordable cost. We have no choice. And rather that battle this out in a left vs. right confrontation, unions, educational policy experts and governments need to come together to fix the system, before the voters, sick of the whole mess, destroy the vestiges of what was once the best educational system on earth.

I’m Peter Dekom, and the surest way to destroy America is to fail to educate our future generations sufficiently.