California court ruling on tenure good for education


Last week, Judge Rolf M. Treu of the Los Angeles Superior Court ruled against tenure, claiming laws protecting teachers from being fired prevent students from accessing “a basically equal opportunity to achieve a quality education.” Opponents of his decision believe that without protection, good teachers will be fired and the educational system as a whole will suffer.

Though there are plenty of valid arguments for tenure — and there is certainly a lot of ground to cover before our educational achievement gap is fixed — Judge Treu’s decision is ultimately a step in the right direction, addressing systemic failures in the education system. Furthermore, it will set a precedent nationally that will give more states more leverage to implement necessary education reform.

The case, Vergara v. California, was brought about by a group of students claiming that tenure laws protecting bad teachers deprived them of the education they deserved. The students were backed by David Welch, a Silicon Valley millionaire who started the group “Students Matter” — although this case was specific to California, the group plans to file lawsuits in states throughout the country.

Educational reform in America is an incredibly complex issue, one that will not be solved just by eliminating tenure. But tenure represents a culture of refusing to hold teachers accountable for their actions, and removing it is a good way to begin changing this.

In California, a teacher can receive tenure in just two years, essentially guaranteeing a lifetime job based on a very short amount of time. This presumes that the effectiveness of teachers doesn’t change over their career, a fundamental flaw in the hiring system — over a career of potentially 30 years or more, it is entirely probable that good teachers could burn out, or bad teachers might improve. A teaching career should not be made or broken based on just two early years.

It is true that teaching is a uniquely difficult job, and teachers should not have to feel as if their career is in jeopardy — this itself would be counterproductive to effective teaching. And it is admittedly difficult to receive useful and reputable feedback from students and peers of teachers, as the concept of an “effective teacher” is very subjective. But the current tenure system is not the answer to these issues; according to the New York Times, firing a teacher can take almost a decade and cost up to $450,000.

This kind of protection is unheard of in any other profession. If a doctor behaves unprofessionally, they lose their medical license because they could potentially hurt their patients — a bad teacher’s impact on their students’ lives, however, is protected and ignored. It forces school administrators to either keep bad teachers or — in many cases — to transfer them to another school. This has a hugely negative impact especially on schools in low-income areas, where they cannot afford to transfer these ineffective teachers.

Where Judge Treu’s ruling falls short, though, is in its failure to offer alternative options and by placing too much blame on the tenure system for causing problems in education. Simply removing tenure is likely to be fought to the point where it is either appealed or has a negative impact on the pool of potential new teachers — such a drastic policy change is very likely to backfire. Instead, policymakers should be fighting for a system in which teachers are offered a certain level of stability, but are evaluated periodically over the course of their careers. This would make the change in policy easier to stomach for teachers and unions, while still addressing the problem of teachers’ effectiveness dropping over their career.

Problems with education in America aren’t going to be solved overnight, but the Vergara v. California is significant in that it is addressing one of the real causes: a lack of accountability on the part of teachers. Too often blame is placed on the students themselves, and policies are made to treat symptoms rather than the real problems, such as when test standards are lowered to create the illusion of students passing. Although policymakers should be cautious of such a dramatic change in policy,  if they remove tenure while simultaneously implementing other necessary educational reforms it will be a very positive step.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan of the Obama Administration applauded the decision, claiming it will “build a new framework for the teaching profession.” The impact of this decision will reach farther than just California — depending on how this new framework is implemented, it could signal a positive change in educational policy on a national level.

 

 

Burke Gibson is an incoming senior majoring in economics and is the editorial director of the  Daily Trojan.

1 reply
  1. Liberty Minded
    Liberty Minded says:

    One of the points that you missed is that tenure often goes to those with conforming views, The goal of tenure was not to create a monolithic culture of education.

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