Teachers speak in defense of tenure

By JACKIE BORCHARDT - Star-Tribune staff writer

One of Mike Riley’s journalism students wrote an editorial in the school newspaper about old people being terrible drivers and not deserving respect.

The Cody High School student was out in left field, the editorial wasn’t profane, and the student was well within his First Amendment rights, Riley said.

The principal disagreed.

Riley wasn’t fired because he had continuing-contract status. The status, awarded after three years of teaching in a particular district, protects teachers from being fired for personal or arbitrary reasons. Administrators must determine “good or just cause” when firing a continuing-contract teacher, and the teacher has the right to an independent hearing upon termination.

“Without continuing contract, I would have been fired in a matter of hours because of opinions expressed by my students that administrators didn’t agree with,” Riley said.

Continuing contracts, referred to as “teacher tenure,” became a target for lawmakers this legislative session in an effort to hold schools accountable for state funding.

When Sen. Hank Coe, R-Cody, drafted the first tenure bill, he said he didn’t believe in the idea of tenure. His goal was to get rid of ineffective teachers. He said good teachers shouldn’t worry about losing tenure.

Superintendent of Public Instruction Cindy Hill agreed in a statement released Feb. 4. Most teachers are hard-working professionals, she wrote, but a “handful” are “misplaced.”

“So who would be interested in maintaining tenure?” Hill wrote. “Non-performing teachers. I know that this is often the case.”

Hill did not return calls from the Star-Tribune last week.

Few would argue that Riley, who has taught journalism and English for 37 years, is non-performing. He has been an active member of the Journalism Education Association. He taught literature classes for at-risk students.

One of those classes almost got him fired. He chose books with high student interest, and a school board member disagreed with one.

Another school board member wanted to fire him after he disciplined a student on the tennis court.

Riley said he didn’t understand why his local senator and others thought tenure to be the biggest problem in education. He said most of the “bad teachers” he’s known quit before they could be fired.

Brad Miller, who also teaches at Cody High School, said teachers are “counseled out” of the profession more than terminated. He doesn’t hear about terminations often and estimated about 24 continuing contract teachers have been terminated in his 25 years of teaching.

“There ought to be some kind of accountability,” Miller said. “But when you’re dealing with people and parents, there needs to be protection.”

Miller once had the superintendent’s daughter in class and was warned to give her a good grade. He worried about how that accountability will be measured. If one of his calculus students scores poorly on a state math test, is he to blame? Or is the student’s past teacher to blame?

If the accountability bills pass, many of these details will be worked out by superintendents, principals and even teachers before reaching lawmakers — a “world-class Wyoming system,” as one lawmaker called it.

Read more: http://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/article_326b28de-3204-5b35-bf7c-b7fcf29e8846.html