AN, since you seem to think that unions and teacher tenure are the problem, can you point to any studies that compare outcomes from schools where teacher tenure/union is the rule vs. schools where teachers are at-will, non-union employees with no rights to due process?
Remember, the key is to compare apples to apples, so variables regarding student/parent demographics/SES, and teachers’ resources must be held constant.
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Edited to add:
Let’s even assume that we would want to get rid of teacher tenure. This would mean that teacher turnover (already very high, especially among newer teachers) would rise even further. Do you have any evidence to show that if you were to fire 100 experienced (but supposedly deficient) teachers that the pool of 100 new teachers would be any better? Again, it’s very well known in education circles that new teachers have a very steep learning curve and that most new teachers are deficient when compared to experienced teachers.
