[quote]Get rid of tenure. A teacher should be able to be fired easier if they are not good at their job.
Tenure only means they have to tell you WHY you are being fired.
It's very easy to get rid of a teacher.
It's not very easy, actually. The measure of "why" has changed greatly from when we were young. And you don't just have to say why - you have to convince the court that the "why" deserves termination. Years ago, I saw $30K spent on lawyers trying to get rid of a terrible teacher, by many measures, and the District lost it's case because what is acceptable to the Unions is far beyond what's acceptable to the common adult. That would easily be $70K in today's costs. And it's certainly more difficult today.
And it's not just teachers. I had volumes of documentation on a support person who desperately needed to be somewhere else and it took the 3rd superintendent to allow me to move forward. Even the school solicitor was hesitant, not because of the case, but because he was afraid of the implications of firing a school employee in the public's eye. When the Board President saw the evidence during the hearing, the case ended very quickly and she was finally gone, but it took nearly 10 years.
Tenure has its merits, but should not be as powerful as it is. A good teacher today can easily show the data to support staying in the profession.
