I'm just curious, do any private (K-12) schools have a system of teacher tenure?

[bluestateguy]

Does it exist anywhere? One of the things that would scare me about teaching in a private school (especially one with a lot of rich powerful parents) would be the ability to be fired on a whim, over some BS reason, or because you butted heads with some snotty kid whose parents have a lot of money.

I'm not saying teacher tenure is a perfect system. One teacher in my public high school definitely abused it, but I think it is better than the alternative.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. Without a union, very unlikely you will be offered tenure in your contract.

And one tends to find unions in public schools rather than private schools.

[JDPriestly]

3. Why is there no union for teachers in private schools?

Seems to me that there would be a big demand for that.

[no_hypocrisy]

9. There are much fewer as private schools want to tap down on "expenses"

meaning salaries based on collective bargaining with its teachers. Not to mention the ability to hire any teacher for any reason or no reason at all.

[JDPriestly]

11. Unions could still organize.

Unless the teachers unions organize the teachers in charter and private schools, unions are simply acquiescing to their own destruction. And doing a great disfavor to the teachers in charter and private schools. If it weren't for the unions, public schools would have an at-will employment policy and teachers would be fired and hired willy-nilly.

[tonysam]

14. They are anyway, I hate to tell you. Tenure isn't what people think it is.

All having tenure is in public education is the "right" to a hearing in cases of termination. But the hearings are utterly rigged in favor of principals, and the districts will coerce your colleagues to lie for the principals, they will alter documents, and they will bribe witnesses for YOU so that you have none, as happened in my case. It is virtually impossible to win "tenure" hearings, as the hearing officers are by definition on the take with the districts and want to be able to continue doing business with them.

You still have to hire an outside lawyer and sue their ass, assuming you were fired wrongfully as I was.

[JDPriestly]

16. Unions should not permit these kangaroo courts to exist.

Wrongful termination cases should be tried in courts where you can enforce your right to discover the documents pertaining to your case.

[tonysam]

17. I totally agree with you. Unfortunately, that's not the way the system works.

My recommendations for education reform include that these hearings actually be "due process" hearings, but they aren't in reality. The rules applying to court cases including perjury, forgery, discovery, and all of the rest, would apply in these hearings. In reality, the districts do whatever the hell they want. The hearings are held on school property, and the hearing officers are paid, at least in Nevada, by the union and by the district (i.e., the taxpayers, and the hearings can run up to $100,000 or more a pop), which are actually one and the same (other states have the hearing officers supplied by the state, but they aren't any more fair to teachers). The teacher is alone to fight everybody.

You are limited in appealing a decision by the hearing officer, which almost always favors the district, so you have to get a lawyer on the outside to fight your case and at your expense.

In other words, a "due process" hearing is a total joke.

[Dinger]

2. Wonder How That Works In Charter Schools?

Which are a path to privatization.

[noamnety]

8. I can answer that for Michigan

Public charter schools are prohibited by state government here from offering tenure. That's not the choice of the school itself, nor the school administration, or anyone local.

Where I teach, we thought we'd be allowed to have tenure, we had a small ceremony thing when the first 4 teachers at our school were tenured. Then we were informed the state dept of education wouldn't allow us to tenure them, so it was revoked. I don't understand the logic of that ... especially as the teachers are truly public employees, no corporate sponsorship, our chartering agent is the county intermediate school district, they handle our pay and benefits like every other public teacher in the county.

[Generic Other]

4. No education, no union, no contracts means no academic freedom

We can all point to someone we thought shouldn't be in the classroom. Should we therefore take away everyone's rights? I think you are confusing tenure and seniority. Tenure means the freedom to study whatever I deem worthy of focusing my academic eye on. Seniority is a list for lay-offs.

[LibDemAlways]

5. I taught in a private school 25 years ago. Witnessed a new principal coming

in and "cleaning house." Made life miserable for all of the well-established teachers. One was fired. The rest quit. She then hired a bunch of young, just out of college, would work cheap replacements.

Tenure exists for a reason.

[Dinger]

12. Well, That's Where Education Is Headed In This Country

Guess that's change at least. One we can believe in? Well, that's up to you.

[KansDem]

6. Good question. When I was working at a small four-year Catholic college in the late 1980s...

As a member of the "administrative staff" (librarian), we were told we didn't have "sick leave" per se, but rather "sick days" would be determined by our supervisor. I had a real anal-retentive "supervisor" who would question me the day I returned from an illness. She would want to know the extent of my illness and what medicines I had taken.

I was only sick a few times never exceeding 1 or 2 days, but still had to "defend" my time off.

After four years of this bullshit, I was never so happy to leave a job than I was that one!

[Bentcorner]

7. Yes, imagine living in a world where you could be fired on a whim by your employer. I cannot

imagine what a horror that would be!

[Warren Stupidity]

10. 2s on google. Of course.

For example, Phillips Exeter Academy. You just have to head up the food chain to where the rich folks nurture their young, and there you will find that they have an interest in the quality of the people allowed to train their children's minds.

oops here's the data:

"Exeter’s faculty is one of the school’s greatest assets. The school has 140 full-time,
tenured and tenure-track faculty members and 60 part-time and adjunct instructors (the
majority of whom teach individual music lessons). Faculty members have been carefully
recruited from many different academic and personal backgrounds to support the
exceptional quality and diversity of intellectual and student life at the school. More than
eighty percent of faculty hold advanced degrees in their fields, one quarter of which are
Ph.D.s."
http://www.exeter.edu/documents/PEA_Principal_SPC_FINAL.pdf

[tonysam]

13. They fire you anyway for all kinds of bogus reasons in public schools, and it is getting worse

with the likes of the privatizers having infested the system.

Tenure is NOT "lifetime" employment; hell, all it really does is put a brake on unscrupulous principals from getting rid of teachers they don't happen to like. But even then, all a principal has to do is create a false paper trail against an older or veteran teacher, and it's all over for them. Hell, in my case the negligent principal didn't even HAVE a paper trail against me. Principals have ironclad job security thanks to the district putting scads of taxpayer money in defending them in rigged tenure hearings and in state and federal courts.

[femmocrat]

15. Absolutely true. Tenure is a "myth" that right wingers love to rattle around to berate teachers.

The administration can fire at will and cook up whatever reason they think will fly.

I was furloughed after 7 years (4 of them tenured) and perfect ratings based on fabricated "enrollment" numbers. They merely cancelled my course. I wasn't called back until there was a retirement in my department. I was recalled THANKS to my union or I would probably still be unemployed.

Many districts are letting young teachers go before granting tenure now. They can replace them with fresh recruits at a lower wage.