(Cross-posted at FCAR Speakout)

Marion Brady (retired educator, author, columnist) is one of the best thinkers in America on the subject of education. He's also one of the most consistently ignored, at least among the movers and shakers who make education policy.

In this slide show, which Brady calls "A reaction to Corporate America's big "RIGOR!" push," he takes his essential message and puts it into terms so simple that even corporate CEOs and politicians can understand it. Of course, it's not the message they want to hear, so it'll likely still fall on deaf ears (including those of Barack Obama and Arne Duncan).

I am sick to death of St. Petersburg Times writer Ron Matus' anti-tenure (anti-teacher?) campaign. His latest "special report" It takes a lot to dismiss a teacher is just the latest in a series of misleading pieces by Matus. His premise in the article is that tenure makes it too hard to fire bad teachers, yet the few examples he gives don't demonstrate that, but rather, simply show inaction on the part of school districts.

If Matus had found districts attempting but failing to fire bad teachers, he might have a point. But the "evidence" he provides does not prove his point. So why did this tripe get published anyway? Why is the Times giving so much prominent space to such crap?

You see, the drive to get rid of tenure is an effort to instill fear in teachers and keep them silent. Teachers living in fear of their jobs can't afford to speak up for or advocate for their students, themselves, or their profession. I know this from personal experience. I used to work for a principal who was a petty tyrant- incredibly insecure, mean-spirited, and vindictive. She told me straight out that if we were in the private sector, I'd no longer have a job. My crime? I was the union rep and dared to question her abuse of the faculty and staff.

Without tenure, I'd have had to either shut up and let her abuses go unchallenged, or I'd have been fired. That despite the fact that my faculty respected me enough to elect me teacher of the year, despite the fact that since transferring, and continuing to be the union rep at my school, I've had no problems with those administrators and have gotten excellent evaluations from them.

Last year, I got the MAP bonus, which according to a privious article by Ron Matus, indicates who the good teachers are (I'd say it's a crap shoot as to who gets it). By any account, I'm not less than an average teacher, and perhaps a bit better than that. Yet without tenure, I would no longer be a teacher. I know that for a fact, because my former principal said it straight out to my face.

Getting rid of tenure (read: due process) might make it easier to dismiss people who shouldn't be in teaching. It would also make it easy to dismiss good teachers, even the great ones, because the great ones are the ones who stand up for their students, themselves, and their profession, and in doing so, sometimes step on toes. Parents, especially, should beware of newspaper reporters and politicians proposing the end of tenure. Do you really want a timid, frightened teacher in charge of your child's class, or an empowered professional willing to go to bat for your child?

Think about it.

Update: My letter to the editor on this subject was published in the St. Petersburg Times on April 4, 2009.

I sat down for a brief interview the other day for the WUSF-TV program Florida Matters. I have a brief sound bite about 5:38 into the show. Don't fast forward to that part, though, as the entire first segment about the current funding crisis and the FCAT is very good. In the FCAT section, you'll also see Dr. Sherman Dorn of USF and Teri Pinney, a former school administrator who recently published a novel based on her real experiences as an administrator in the age of FCAT.

On Wednesday, January 14, 2009, a letter appeared in the St. Petersburg Times entitled "A threat to freedoms." The writer purports to inform the reader about the horrific ramifications of passing the Employee Free Choice Act. I simply could not let the factual errors and fantasies in this letter go unanswered, so I wrote a letter of my own. My letter was published today (Saturday, January 17, 2009).

A threat to freedoms | Jan. 14, letter

It's about worker rights

The letter writer is badly misinformed about the Employee Free Choice Act.

For example, the writer states that "EFCA would strip employees of the right to vote by secret ballot." This is flat-out wrong. Both secret ballot and card check are already options, and both would still be options under EFCA. EFCA, though, would require the National Labor Relations Board to certify a union if the majority of workers at a site sign authorization cards in favor of that union. This too is democratic, by the way.

The writer claims EFCA would leave "workers vulnerable to peer pressure and manipulation." This claim is laughable, especially considering that currently, all the pressure and manipulation is done by businesses illegally preventing their employees from organizing.

Businesses regularly (and illegally) fire employees involved in organizing unions, hire "union busters" to fight organizing drives, force employees to attend mandatory, closed-door meetings against the union, close plants where unions are certified, or refuse to negotiate with certified unions.

The Employee Free Choice Act would not "take away" a "personal choice" as the letter writer states. To the contrary, it would finally restore to the worker his or her "personal choice" to join a union.

John L. Perry, Tampa