Teachers Debunk Tenure Myth

We won't quibble over semantics, but it is well known that public school teachers in Georgia have job and salary protection commonly known as tenure. Unlike the system for college professors, public school tenure applies to all teachers who manage to hang on for three years, no extra work required, no questions asked. While it is claimed that even tenured teachers can be fired for several reasons, it is expensive, burdensome and requires years. And even though the reasons are alleged to include "incompetence" it is painfully clear from the educators' abysmal performance that what constitutes "competent" in their cloistered world is "abject failure" in any other domain.

For decades teachers and their so called "non-union" lobbying organizations have claimed that this tenure, this job protection program, is necessary to shield classroom teachers from system politics and capricious principles and administrators.  But as we all know, actions speak louder than words, and teachers themselves have acted.

We have on display a cadre of "Cheater Teachers", many of whom confessed to their crimes, using their tenure to delay termination and further milk the taxpayer for all they can. What they offer as justification for their actions drives a stake through the heart of tenure justification: they claim that  principals and administrators made them cheat by threatening them with retribution if they did not.

Clearly tenure does not work.

It did not create a climate safe for whistle blowers. It did not provide any of these teachers a moral crutch for the spina bifada of their character. In fact, it protects only the incompetent, as those, the few, that are competent need no such protection.

The only sane and reasonable option is to end public school tenure now, by eliminating it for all teachers including those who currently ride this gravy train.