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At least at the K-12 level, teachers don't have a right to teach their students whatever they feel is appropriate. There are state and national standards -- bac

At least at the K-12 level, teachers don't have a right to teach their students whatever they feel is appropriate. There are state and national standards -- backed by assessments -- that mandate what teachers should be teaching and measure whether those teachers are doing a good job. Teachers are employees like any other employee. At my job I don't get to work on whatever I want whenever I disagree with the majority opinion about how my time should be spent, and most companies would be terrible if employees had "tenure" where they could work on whatever they wanted -- including "working on this sandwich before an afternoon nap." (And if that sounds like a straw man, Google around for videos like these: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eE5VkcwKwP0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eE5VkcwKwP0)

adrr 12y ago
Thats the point i am trying to make. When Kansas removed evolution out of curriculum, teachers still taught it because they couldn't get fired. Thats what tenure protects, that our education system is not affected by majority opinion and changes political climate. Now that Kansas has removed tenure, the next time the education board bans evolution which seems to happen every 5 years, teachers will have to comply or get fired.
- eastbayjake 12y ago
  And the point I'm trying to make is that curriculum choices at the K-12 level are a democratic decision, not a matter of personal conscience by educators. You don't get paid by the government to teach whatever you like, you get paid to teach what the government pays you to teach, and you're evaluated based on how well students know the material the government asks you to teach them. Removing evolution from the curriculum is a political problem that voters need to solve. It's not something you can fix through teacher autonomy. The real issue is getting politicians and administrators to ask teachers to teach the right things, and it's their fault -- not teachers -- when the curriculum is bad.

adrr 12y ago

Thats the point i am trying to make. When Kansas removed evolution out of curriculum, teachers still taught it because they couldn't get fired. Thats what tenure protects, that our education system is not affected by majority opinion and changes political climate. Now that Kansas has removed tenure, the next time the education board bans evolution which seems to happen every 5 years, teachers will have to comply or get fired.

eastbayjake 12y ago
And the point I'm trying to make is that curriculum choices at the K-12 level are a democratic decision, not a matter of personal conscience by educators. You don't get paid by the government to teach whatever you like, you get paid to teach what the government pays you to teach, and you're evaluated based on how well students know the material the government asks you to teach them. Removing evolution from the curriculum is a political problem that voters need to solve. It's not something you can fix through teacher autonomy. The real issue is getting politicians and administrators to ask teachers to teach the right things, and it's their fault -- not teachers -- when the curriculum is bad.