Teacher Tenure Back in Play

I think it’s crazy that I have friends with students and real jobs; one of them posted this to facebook the other day. It gives me perspective. Though I’m not looking to go into education any more, these things could potentially affect my life in a few years.

http://wunc.org/post/judge-law-repealing-teacher-tenure-unconstitutional

A North Carolina law proposed in 2013 sparked much controversy in the education community. It did away with teacher tenure, required school districts to offer-one year contracts to teachers, and offered the top twenty-five percent of teachers a small annual pay raise. The law was declared unconstitutional on Friday by a North Carolina superior court judge who argued that it is unlawful to take away teacher tenure because it violated the constitutional protection of contracts.

Opponents of the law point out that it did not provide a standard to choose the top twenty-five percent of teachers. The work that teachers do is different depending on the subject and grade level taught, and there is not real way to measure effective or ineffective teachers. Meanwhile, advocates of the law point out its ability to weed out inefficient teachers.

If this doesn’t scream government, I don’t know what does. It might not be the Supreme Court, but this is still judicial review at the state level. In declaring this law unconstitutional, Judge Robert Hobgood summarized a lot of things that we value in North Carolina and in the United States. Contracts are wonderful tools, and they are to be honored. Additionally, many aspects of education are regulated by the government but this can’t be one of them.

I could say it a thousand times: teachers deserve much more than what they’re given. It takes a truly special soul to sit in a classroom with children for eight hours a day, explain the simplest concepts over and over, grade papers, keep their sanity, and even excel at what they do. I’m sure we’ve all been in rooms where the adult in charge couldn’t do these things and we know how awful it is.

Teachers do much more than teach. They coach sports teams. They direct musicals and band concerts. They act as tutors, therapists, and guidance counselors. The scope of their actions is unprecedented for they are the ones that help raise our children, our future. For some students, teachers become like family. For others, their actions seem greater because they are not family; they are not obligated to do what they do. Teachers could have chosen any other profession, yet they stick with what has become an increasingly challenging career. I say challenging not only because of the snarky students, but because it seems the working environment has deteriorated in the past couple of years, particularly in North Carolina. This law was not helping, and I’m glad it was struck down.

“We deserve to be respected”