Teacher Tenure Argumentative Essay

Argumentative Essay

Teacher tenure. What does this word mean? In many's eyes, tenure is seen as an unfair advantage to teachers and a cruel rule to students. However, according to teacherunion.com, “tenure is the practice of guaranteeing a teacher their job.” Typically, all teachers earn this privilege through quantity, and not by quality. Just a few years after starting to teach, they are granted tenure. And because of Teacher’s Union, it is almost impossible to break a teacher (i.e. a bad teacher) from this rule.

Teacher tenure is a highly debatable topic- Should it be kept or banned forever in all schools? However, there is clearly only one explanation to this problem: We simply cannot continue with teacher tenure. It has passed it’s expiration date

and can no longer be useful in today’s world. Tenure is way too costly. Also, teacher tenure was, and still is, a terrible idea, why else would society be faced with so many failing students?
Now just to start off, tenure is no longer needed in today’s norm.

During the late 18th century, tenure was passed in order to protect teachers against discrimination, such as race, gender, political stands, age, ethnical backgrounds, and religion. Today, society is more accepting of people’s differences than ever before. Since the world is so equal today, why do we still have tenure? The same discrimination can happen with any other job, too. What makes teachers so special?

According to one of many tenure debates lead by teachers themselves, tenure no longer fits the original criteria to why it was started in the first place (because of gender, race, religion, political stands, etc.). However, some may think otherwise. It is true that change will always be a problem in the world one way or another. There is still discrimination in society.

While this is a good point, let's not forget about the positives. Just one example is that gender discrimination is at it’s lowest point yet in America, right now. It is also true that the main reasons to why tenure was created in the first place is no longer as important now-a-days. Therefore, in conclusion, tenure is very out of date and should not be tolerated any

longer.
Also, tenure costs districts way too much time and money to maintain. One of the main reasons to why tenure is so terrible is because it is way too expensive for schools to handle when it comes to a bad teacher. Because of tenure, teachers are intertwined with tons of complicated and useless rules and rights, making it nearly impossible to fire a teacher. For example, in the widely noted website, teacherunionexposed.com, it states that “According to Albany Times Union, the average process for firing a teacher in New York state outside of New York City proper lasts 502 days and costs more than $216,000.” Now if this isn’t surprising, then I don’t know what is. Even with tenure’s minimal extra income in school districts, it does not even come close to overseeing its vast expenses and time consuming problems to be classified as maybe even somewhat useful.
Lastly, tenure results in failing students. As stated previously, tenure makes it very difficult to fire a teacher. This makes bad teachers way too common and usually results in a whole lot of students struggling in their academics. As stated by teacherunionexpossed.com, “Between the 2001-2002 and the 2004-2005 school years, Newark [New Jersey's] graduation rate… was a mere 30.6 percent.” This is because only 47 out of 100,000 teachers were fired in Newark in those past 10 years.
Now officials may argue that teacher tenure is not all to blame when it comes to poor performance in academics. As recently stated by AFT President, Randi Weingarten, “It’s wrong to suggest that if we just fire lots of teachers, we have cured the problem of failing schools.”
While part of this is reasonable, it is quite clear that teacher tenure is the biggest reason to failing students. It keeps bad teachers in schools and this negatively affects kids and teens, what more is there to say? Overall, this is a big problems and needs to be stopped NOW. Afterall, what good is our nation’s future with all these struggling kids?
In conclusion, teacher tenure is a terrible idea and needs to be stopped right now before it brings anymore harm to this world. Tenure no longer fits the criteria that it was originally slated for. Also, tenure is too much to handle for most school districts. Finally, tenure is the main reason to why schools have failing students.
Open your eyes. Tenure is a major problem in our school systems. If this ridiculous procedure continues, what will the future become? Just look at China and India. These countries hold some of the highest performing schools in the world. And guess what? They don’t have tenure! What’s the big deal America? Let's get a move on! We need to act fast now, before it’s too late. School is the basis to life and to the outcomes of the future. Don’t let teacher tenure ruin this.