Guilford school board to sue State over teacher tenure law | Eastern North Carolina Now

    The Guilford County Board of Education has voted unanimously to file a lawsuit against the State of North Carolina contesting the new law that replaces teacher tenure with term contracts plus a salary bonus. The state's largest teachers' organization, the N. C. Association of Educators, has also filed suit against the new law passed last session by the Republican controlled General Assembly. The NCAE is also leading a movement to have teachers who would qualify for the new contracts to refuse to give up their career status if offered a new term contract.

    The Greensboro News and Record reports on the Guilford Board of Education action February 12, 2014:

    The Guilford County Board of Education plans to sue the state over a new law that would abolish teacher tenure.

    The school board voted unanimously Tuesday to challenge the law and ask for relief from laws requiring it to offer contracts to certain teachers in exchange for their tenure. Board members said the law is unconstitutional, and its wording unclear. The board said the law "represents yet another thinly veiled attack on public education and educators."

    The board's next step is to file a lawsuit in Guilford County Superior Court, said Nora Carr, Guilford County Schools' chief of staff.

    Teachers in the audience stood and clapped as the board's vote appeared on a TV screen. Then board members and school system staff members stood and clapped for teachers.

    Earlier in the day, the leader of the state Senate, Phil Berger, a Rockingham County Republican, sent a letter to Guilford County Schools leaders expressing concern over the board's plan to disregard the law.

    Berger said in the letter to Superintendent Maurice "Mo" Green that he is "deeply troubled by reports that the Guilford County School Board is considering ignoring a law enacted to recognize and reward excellent teachers."

    That action would be illegal and represents "a 'picking and choosing' of which laws the Board intends to follow and punishes top teachers for purely political reasons."

    Board members also seem to be "grasping at straws for a legal argument to support their preference for the status quo on teacher pay," Berger said.

    "Attempts to manufacture legal arguments to derail policy directives may be even more underhanded than openly refusing to follow the law," he wrote.

    "Like the rest of us, local officials cannot pick and choose which laws to follow," Berger said. "Such action would give them an unconstitutional veto over the laws enacted by elected representatives in the General Assembly."

    School leaders across the state have until July 1 to select teachers to offer a new four-year contract, as well as a compounding $500 pay increase.

    But Jill Wilson, the attorney for the Guilford County school board, challenged the law's constitutionality.

    With tenure, state law protects teachers from having their status changed or salary reduced without due process. The law also details the grounds under which they can be removed or demoted.

    Wilson said the state has not appropriated enough money to cover the first year of pay increases that would be offered with the contracts. She also described other issues with how teachers would be selected and awarded contracts under the law.

    Almost 200 teachers and community members, most wearing red for public education, packed the school system's central office. About an hour before the meeting started, teachers  -  some from out of state  -  chanted while they held signs protesting recent legislation affecting education.

    Click here to go to the original source to read the rest of the story.

    Commentary

    We commend the Guilford County Board of Education for taking this action. We have previously posted an article here that perfectly illustrates why teacher (or administrator) tenure should not be abolished until the Legislature fixes what is wrong with local school boards, as illustrated by what happened in Perquimans County.

    The problem here is the classic "the devil is in the details." Getting rid of bad teachers is a worthy goal for public policy. But that's not where the problem comes. It comes in the way the law is administered.

    For example, here's what the law says about how it is to be determined whether a teacher gets the new term contract (of 1, 2, or 4 years): "A superintendent shall only recommend a teacher for a contract of a term longer than one school year if the teacher has shown effectiveness as demonstrated by proficiency on the evaluation instrument." (NCGS 115C-325.3) Thus, it's obvious to see that the law is vague and extremely susceptible to misinterpretation. Moreover, only 25% of the teachers can get the term contract with the bonus. So what happens if 50% of the teachers are actually "proficient on the evaluation instrument"?

    "But we'll work out all those details..." you might expect to hear the backers of this new law say. Well, we would say to that: "Work out all the details and then change the current system, but don't get the cart before the horse."

    This is a mess. It is causing extreme and un-necessary turmoil in our schools. The Legislature should, when the short session convenes, put a moratorium on the implementation of this law until the legal challenges have been resolved and an effective assessment system tested and proven valid and reliable. Then an objective study should done to determine what percentage of teachers are not "proficient" before some arbitrary number is pulled out of thin air to determine who gets a "gold star"and who hits the road.

    And the Legislature might just want to find a merit pay system that has actually worked somewhere before they jump into this swamp of alligators.

    Delma Blinson writes the "Teacher's Desk" column for our friend in the local publishing business: The Beaufort Observer. His concentration is in the area of his expertise - the education of our youth. He is a former teacher, principal, superintendent and university professor.