Tenure works to give teachers more freedom by “strengthening legal protections embodied in civil service, civil rights, and labor laws by shifting to the employer the burden to prove the termination is justified” (Kahlenberg, 2015). Tenure allows teachers to feel safer and more comfortable with their jobs, knowing that they cannot be fired for unjustified and illegitimate reasons. Tenure also gives “teachers’ freedom to experiment or support controversial causes,” which is very much needed, because if teachers do not feel as if they can try new things, there is no way for them to improve as teachers (Chen, 2009). If new teachers can go to a school knowing they have time to learn their teaching style and cannot be punished if what they do is controversial, teaching will be more appealing to them. In many cases teaching is improved by letting the teacher do their job their own way. By providing a stable job, which in turn serves to “attract many teachers to the teaching profession,” the quality of teachers in schools begins to improve (Akhavan, 2016). The teaching industry is in dire need of new teachers to join and some aspects of tenure actually work to improve this. However, giving teachers increased job security can also lead to many other consequences that are not only …show more content…
This would not be done to punish the high school teachers; it would be done in the best interest of the school’s teacher quality. Tenure serves “create teacher complacency” since teachers know that they are not in major danger of losing their jobs (Akhavan, 2016). Tenure leads teachers to slowly grow more and more lackadaisical in their work since they will be protected either way. Whether they perform highly for their students or become lazy, tenure entitles them to do as they wish and will continue to protect their jobs. Teachers should not be given a reason to become complacent and, in turn, lack in their performance. When complacency occurs, not only does it worsen the teacher’s performance, but it also worsens the student’s grades because of the teacher’s poor performance. This alone proves that tenure is “not in the best interest of children” because tenure protects teachers from losing their jobs even if there were to be a legitimate reason why they should be fired, such as complacency (Chen, 2008). If high school teachers receive tenure, there are more bad consequences in ratio to good consequences that can occur. If teachers at a school are considered bad it would worsen the school’s quality of faculty. High schools are already “having a hard time recruiting talented individuals” due to