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Teacher's Tenure: A Necessity

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Teacher's Tenure: A Necessity
Out with the Old in with the New

Education is the single most important factor in not only an individual’s life and their outcome for success, but also the outcome of future success in America. In order for our country to be successful we must invest in our future generations and the training they will need once they move on to their future endeavors. Although America spends vast amounts of money each year on education, money is not always the answer. We must improve the performance in our classrooms by making sure we have the strongest faculty possible. Teachers being given the luxury of tenure are hurting student performance and the performance of America. Tenure is not only allowing teachers to keep their jobs secure based off experience rather than performance, but also it is this job protection that makes the removal of poorly performing teachers so difficult and costly. In a result, most schools end up retaining their bad teachers. Teachers having tenure is a very controversial issue in today’s society. There are many pros and cons to this subject, but it is crucial that we have the strongest faculty we can in order to have a bright and prosperous future for this country. Teacher’s tenure is a form of job protection that public school teachers receive after 1-7 years on the job. It was created in the early 1920s in order to protect teachers from losing their jobs to younger less expensive teachers. According to Time U.S. magazine, “Roughly 2.3 million public school teachers in the U.S. have tenure”(Stephey). With all the budget cuts that have happened, many talented, energetic and young teachers are being fired in order for other teachers to keep their job. Teacher’s job security should be based on performance in the classroom rather than years a teacher’s been teaching. Teacher’s tenure is one of the most controversial issues in education today. Many people argue that it protects teachers from being fired for personal or political

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