Betsy Combier
Three Myths of Teacher Tenure
So it always
surprises me to hear regular people repeat the smears against teachers’ job
security. They’re parroting the message of those trying to weaken one of the
largest remaining sectors of unionized workers in this country.
When it comes to
teachers’ right to job security, you have to look at why management wants to
get rid of it—if you want to tell fact from fiction. A few common myths:
Myth #1: Teacher tenure means a job for life.
Teacher tenure is
not like academic tenure, which is set up through each university. Faculty
members jump through many hoops before becoming tenured.
But maybe the
differences are beside the point. Both systems lay out clear grounds for
dismissal. A teacher or professor canbe fired—for cause.
K-12 teachers first
won tenure rights over 100 years ago, but it wasn’t through collective
bargaining agreements. The push for tenure systems came out of the desire to
protect teachers and districts from the politically motivated firings that came
with patronage politics.
It became a way to
protect women, pregnant teachers, and people of color from discrimination. Also
teachers with controversial views—read, “pro-union.”
In fact, today
charter school teachers are organizing unions so they too can bargain for, you
guessed it, job security.
Myth #2: It’s impossible to fire a tenured teacher.
Research shows
teachers are fired more often than federal workers—above 2 percent, compared to .02
percent a year. These figures come from Dana Goldstein’s new book, The Teacher Wars: A History of America’s Most Embattled
Profession.
Goldstein also
looked at comparable private sector data. These jobs too were more secure than
teaching.
If teachers violate
policy or can’t do their jobs, it’s up to administrators to make a case to
remove them. That’s what due process means.
Myth #3: Teacher tenure is too protective—unlike other sectors’
union protections.
Sure, the process
could be tweaked—for instance, expedited, so it doesn’t punish the unfairly
targeted and doesn’t draw out the appeals of those not equipped to do the
job. (See Union Fights Teacher Jail to read how Los
Angeles teachers get caught in a legal limbo.)
But that’s not what
they want, the people pushing to get rid of due process.
Look at Chicago,
where the unionized teaching force has shrunk by 20 percent, and black teachers
dwindled from 45 to 29 percent. Teachers are facing layoffs year after year,
while non-union charters grow.
Hard to make the
case that teachers have too much job security, isn’t it?
Emboldened by
anti-tenure rhetoric, Philadelphia, Chicago, and L.A. have been bypassing
seniority provisions in district policies and in union contracts. When budgets
are squeezed, districts push to replace veteran teachers with inexperienced
hires at the bottom of the pay scale—or not replace them at all, and make
remaining teachers do more.
That’s not about
what’s best for students. It’s what bosses do, when they can get away with it,
in any industry.
When people say, “Teachers may have needed tenure back then, but
now things are different and they have it too good,” remember: you could easily
replace the word “tenure” with “union.”
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