Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, December 6, 1994 TAG: 9412060044
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PHILLIP HAMILTON
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
In their contract with the people, all elected officials serve a specific term of office. Municipal and other public employees in Virginia do not have the benefit of a contract, much less an indefinitely continuing contract. Not even the president of the Virginia Education Association enjoys an unlimited term of office.
The best job protection is job performance. Employers must be allowed employment flexibility, while providing employees responsible protection under the law, to establish the best work force necessary to produce goods and provide services in our free-market society. This philosophy must extend to the school boards of Virginia, who need to have the flexibility as employers to meet the ever-changing educational needs of our society.
I proposed this change because of my concern for the public's negative perception about the quality of public education. Public education is perceived as a mandated monopoly that has little interest in competition as a way to improve its quality, and seems more interested in its own monopolistic survival by increasing the feed at the public trough.
As long as public education refuses to demonstrate that the educational interests of students and the quality of education - as measured by higher standards of accountability for educators, students and parents - are more important than its own special interests for survival and job protection, this perception of public education will not improve. Until this perception improves, the forces challenging public education will continue to, justifiably, gain strength.
My recent proposals would replace the tenure for licensed public-school employees with five-year contracts that could be renewed in five-year increments. Specifically, my proposals would provide:
Five-year periods of job protection.
Limited due process for the nonrenewal of a term contract.
A policy statement that school divisions should have in place a cooperatively developed performance evaluation plan that promotes the retention of the most highly qualified personnel to teach our students.
Not surprisingly, opposition to the bills has come from politically powerful special-interest groups, the Virginia Education Association, the Virginia Association of Secondary School Principals and the Virginia Association of Elementary School Principals. I suspect there are other special-interest groups that also oppose the bills, but they have not exposed their opposition.
In analyzing the public arguments against the bills from the representatives of teachers and school principals, I am struck by the lack of discussion or documentation about the quality of education. Instead, I hear about the need for job security, the poor performance of administrators in evaluating probationary teachers, academic freedom, the inability of staff-development programs to rehabilitate or update teachers with teaching skills and content knowledge, low teacher morale, and the fear that no one will want to teach in Virginia. Somehow, I thought evidence would be presented to document how the continuing-contract law, which took effect in Virginia in July 1969, had improved the quality of public education.
For the quality of public education to improve, significant change in the philosophy that governs it must occur. The consumers of public education must be given more opportunities within the public schools to choose educational programs for their children. Teachers and administrators must be given meaningful opportunities and incentives to create innovative educational programs that raise standards, improve academic performance and increase accountability. There needs to be a renewed commitment to the value of education in our society.
Efforts to bring about these needed changes will not happen if those responsible for allowing change to occur have no incentive to do so.
It is time to break the cycle of mediocrity that tenure protects. Tenure represents the stagnation produced by job protectionism. This is the moral equivalent of malpractice. If education is going to be the vehicle for improving our society, it is time for a major overhaul.
The taxpayers, the 70 percent who have no direct link to the public schools, expect accountability and quality from the public schools. In the eyes of the beholder, the status quo of public education is producing neither. Competition for clients, strict accountability for job performance, and high standards for academics and behavior are principles that must form the basis for our system of public education, if we are to return individual accountability and responsibility to our society
Phillip Hamilton of Newport News is a Republican member of the Virginia House of Delegates.
by CNB