Last updated on 2015.06.14
Here we go again with another local-control charade from Republicans trying to damage our schools. Senator Al Novstrup (R-3/Aberdeen) is trying to resurrect one loathsome part of Governor Dennis Daugaard's 2012 education reform package. Senate Bill 187 would allow school boards to erase what little due process protection experienced South Dakota teachers have. Specifically, it would allow local schools to opt out of the state's continuing contract laws.
To review: South Dakota K-12 public school teachers have no tenure. South Dakota law (SDCL 13-43, sections 6.1 through 6.9) says that school districts may fire any teacher at any time for just cause. In addition, if a school district chooses not to renew the contract of a teacher who has worked for the district for four years or more, the district must explain in writing how that teacher screwed up. If the non-renewed teacher disagrees with that explanation, the teacher may request a hearing before the school board.
That's it. That's continuing contract. That's one of the few legal protections good teachers have against being let go for bad reasons. Governor Daugaard and the Legislature tried to get rid of that protection last year, and South Dakotans sent that plan to the polls and voted it down hard.
But misplaced hatred of labor and misunderstanding of teacher rights runs deep. Senator Novstrup has rounded up a dozen Republican colleagues to try killing continuing contract again. I can already hear them smirking, "Local control! Local control!" to dodge responsibility for the damage they want to let be done to teachers.
So let me explain again. We must not subject certain rights to local control. All teachers deserve an explanation of how they've failed to teach well enough to be rehired. Your education system is doing fine under continuing contract. Your school boards have all the authority they need to get rid of bad teachers, if they just have the guts to pull that trigger.
South Dakota teachers are not union thugs. Continuing contract is not tenure. Basic labor rights do not threaten your children's education. The real threat to education is a Legislature that keeps trying to drive good teachers out of the profession to states that respect their rights as professionals and workers.
"... Republicans trying to damage our schools."
Right. We Republicans want to damage South Dakota schools. In fact, we will not rest until we have completely destroyed them.
(Yeah, I'm still a Republican, on the record anyhow.)
Stan, I weasel by saying that my phrasing does not include all Republicans. However, given their persistent efforts to bring bad legislation forward and their resistance to passing or even discussing good practical legislation, it's hard not to view many Republicans in the Legislature as enemies of public education.
What is the problem this bill is trying to solve?
Is the continuing contract being horribly abused by teachers?
Is due process a bad thing?
My guess is it is just the sponsors trying to earn their ALEC merit badge playing politics rather than focusing on governing.
I hope there is a vigorous debate on this bill.
Stan, I don't think that Republicans want to destroy schools...they just see them as a nuisance and a liability. A pesky piece of the State's constitution they would rather overlook. That is why they are looking to privatize them and be relieved of that awful burden.
Now destroying collective bargaining units that historically vote Democratic...I think we can both agree that is something that Republicans would like to destroy...no matter what the collateral damage is to our children's education.
Stupid bill. It will cost districts quite a lot of money to develop contracts, which will then be subject to constant legal attack, and incredible legal fees. Continuing contract is a big money saver. If you want to bankrupt schools, this is the bill for you.
Mr. H, you had to see this coming.
This time there are no bonuses for the good teachers that I would like to see. This time nobody's gonna care.
Mr. Gibilisco, the other fellow Mr. Stan in the legislatures is also a (R) and he is a huge backer of the teacher unions and unions in general and will be trying to slap this down with a mallet.
I will say he has a neat blog post about stuff he did back when I used to be a mover and shaker and Mr. Stan was a young buck.
I am heading out to Pierre today for SDEA’s Bargaining Conference. I will be talking about using the negotiations table as a forum for school reform - a topic I am quite excited about as a step toward greater cooperation between teachers and administration in setting better school policy. Especially around the issue of teacher evaluation, local members have resources to begin crafting an evaluation system that both meets the requirements of the state and caters to local needs. My hope is that teachers can take a more active role in pushing for reform and as such, take ownership in that reform. I consider it the “put up or shut up” for the local control I asked for last year in my opposition to 1234.
But then I got the news that two of my local legislators were among the sponsors of SB SB187 (an ominous number in police code) - the bill to allow local districts to opt out of continuing contract provisions in state law. Let me be clear, allowing due process rights, or any rights for that matter, to be “optional” means that they are no longer rights.
I don’t know how the boogieman, the fictional specter of the terrible teacher who keeps his job by hiding behind “tenure” and the union thugs that protect his or her job, became such a rampant fear to our legislators, but certainly this scorched earth approach is their approach to root him out.
The part that really disappoints me as a professional is that we are on the brink of doing something great. For the first time, now that the dust has settled from the HB1234/RL16 conflict and negotiations time is close for many districts, good, locally developed teacher evaluations are within the state’s grasp. What our legislators and proponents of eliminating continuing contract due process rights do not understand is that eliminating continuing contract actually is detrimental to evaluation. Under continuing contract, an administrator has to provide reasons for termination - that is due process. Continuing contract is the piece of the puzzle that forces administrators to be effective evaluators because it very well may be the foundation for removing or improving ineffective teachers. When teachers can be fired “at will,” then there is no incentive to do a good evaluation - it simply is no longer needed. “At will” termination relieves administrators of any accountability; it undermines the evaluation process that both SDEA and the DOE have worked hard to promote. Under an evaluation system that has been locally approved, both sides see that process as fair; both sides understand the expectations and consequences; retention (and professional development) of teachers is finally an agreed upon merit base.
SB187 says now to scrap all that. Certainly pay lip service to evaluation, the law requires that, but none of that evidence of performance is required to be factored in to terminating teachers. Under SB187, termination requires neither thought or reason. It takes evaluation and accountability in SD backward.
I think there is a fear from extremists that if the education were allowed to continue in the direction SDEA would like, this state would have to face up to the fact that its teachers are quite good. Evaluations, will show that, although not perfect, SD’s teachers are really quite a remarkable lot. We would also find that teachers who do underperform are keeping their jobs, not because of due process rights, but because administrators are not doing their jobs and removing them. (What does it say about an administrator who “knows” a teacher is bad, but claims he or she “cannot” fire that teacher because the administrator missed some “arbitrary” deadline? What does it say about an administrator who cannot make it a point to meet a deadline to show reason to rid the school of a liability to students? Certainly that could be put toward the top of the administrator’s “to do” list.)
By the way, I hear the argument that continuing contract is not a protection other workers in our state have. Others are at the whim of their employer’s will, so why not teachers too. It is a fundamental questioning of why teachers get (or deserve) something good that too often comes from a anti-education, “tear them down” mentality. In a state that pays its teachers on average 63% of the national average, in a state that pays its teachers $9,000 less than the second lowest paying state (ND); in a state that continues to increase the expectations of what its teachers succeed in providing for students - academically and socially; in a state that allocates the lowest funding to education - affecting schools’ ability to provide services to students; maybe, just maybe it is OK that teachers get something for that - the right to due process before termination; in real dollars in lost earning, teachers pay for that right.
The labor activist in me thinks maybe MORE employees ought to have due process. Maybe the problem is not that teachers DO have due process, but that others DO NOT. Maybe it is time to rise all boats - not sink the ones currently afloat.
"SD’s teachers are really quite a remarkable lot"
Yes, we now know some should not be teachers as they are not willing to respect the constitutional rights of others. Not a good role model for our kids.
Bless you Steve, even in a due process discussion, you can give me a Second Amendment jab.
"Our kids?" You have no children, Sibby.
Yes, we now know some should not be teachers as they are not willing to respect the constitutional rights of others. Not a good role model for our kids"
. I know I'm hitting my hitting my head against a brick wall, but Steve there are no teachers going after the 2nd amendment. Wake up
"Steve there are no teachers going after the 2nd amendment"
Owen, you are and the testimony I heard confirms it.
OK, so say I'm a new teacher looking for work and my choice is working in a school district that has chosen to opt out of continuing contract and one that follows the due process procedures in place. Which one do you think I will choose? SB187 is just another slap in the face to our teachers and another reason to look for work in another state.
Flee South Dakota, Alan.
Billings is growing, has weather similar to Rapid's, and your vote will actually count instead of being wasted.
Steve O'Brien - go to Pierre to testify. Send me a bill for your gas. I'll pay.
T
his is a local-control-to-do-what's-best-for-each-school-district bill versus a due-process-rights bill. The committee needs to hear from you.
Steve O'Brien, the best post in six month. Thank you for your voice of reason.
The Blindman
Indeed: Steve O'Brien connects the dots in a remarkable way. If we want serious teacher evaluations, we need continuing contract and due process for teachers to motivate administrators to do serious, objective, rock-solid evaluations. Thank you, Steve, for bringing out that aspect of the problem. And thank you, Fred, for your support on this aspect. I want serious evaluations of my performance and of all of my colleagues. If I'm doing something wrong, I want to know so I can fix it. If I'm doing something right, I want to know so I can do more of it and keep my job.
And heck yeah, Alan, if we let schools opt out, we'll see SD schools race to the bottom and SD teachers race to the top of other districts that don't treat them like dirt.
Someone go tell PP that Lee Schoenbeck's personal wealth rivals Stan Adelstein's.