Attack on tenure continues

NEA Today, Apr 1999

If passed, a New Hampshire bill would erode due process rights for the state's teachers.

The New Hampshire legislature will vote this spring on a bill that would make it easier for administrators to dismiss teachers by making it harder for teachers to appeal their local school boards' decisions.

That worries Anne Kirby, an elementary school teacher in Gilmanton and a member of NEA New Hampshire's Executive Board.

"If this bill passes, teachers may stop taking even the smallest risks," says Kirby. "For example, if teachers want to try an innovative practice and their principal isn't supportive, they may give up for fear of losing their jobs."

New Hampshire joins a string of states-Virginia, North Carolina, Texas, and South Dakota, among others-that have seen legislative threats to teachers' professional security in recent years.

Legislators pushing the bills argue that it's too hard to fire bad teachers, but the legislation they propose often shreds basic due process rights to fair treatment.

"No one wants to see bad teachers in the classroom," says Dennis Murphy, director of public affairs for NEA New Hampshire.

"The system needs to protect students from bad teachers," Murphy adds, "but it must protect good teachers from bad administrators and politically motivated school boards."

That's where the New Hampshire legislation falls short.

House Bill 341, filed on February 1, creates two major problems for the state's teachers.

First, to win an appeal, a teacher would have to prove that a local school board's decision was "clearly erroneous;'

That's a standard, Murphy explains, that "sets the bar so high that a teacher is unlikely ever to clear it."

Second, the bill would invalidate collectively bargained contract clause that call for binding arbitration.

"We view that as a full frontal assault on the right of employees to bargain collectively with employers," says Murphy.

What makes the bill even more disturbing: It has the support of New Hampshire Governor Jeanne Shaheen a candidate supported by NEA-New Hampshire in the last election.

"We were extremely disappointed when the governor told us she was going to support the bill," Murphy says, "because we had worked with her to improve current non-renewal procedures."

Anne Kirby and Brian Wazlaw, a science teacher at Exeter High School, represented teachers on the Task Force on Teacher Non-Renewal, which met for three months beginning last July.

Charged by Shaheen with streamlining the current non-renewal law, the task force included teachers, school board members, principals, state legislators, and state education officials.

"I was hopeful the committee's work wouldn't be contentious," Kirby says, but that wasn't to be. One stumblingblock issue emerged: identifying a fair process that would allow a teacher to appeal a non-renewal decision.

NEA New Hampshire originally wanted appeals to go before an independent arbitrator, but was willing to live, notes Exeter High teacher Wazlaw, with "any fair standard for appeal review.

"That could have been the State Board of Education, an administrative law judge, or a personnel board," Wazlaw says.

The state school board association, unfortunately, refused to budge an inch on negotiating a compromise. In the absence of consensus, the governor's office chose the wording that, notes Wazlaw, "we found greatly disappointing."

New Hampshire teachers are now working to stop the bill's passage. Chances are the bill will pass in the Republican-dominated House, so Association members are focusing their opposition on the state Senate, which has a new Democratic majority.

Contact Dennis Murphy, NEA New Hampshire director of public affairs, at 603/224-7751. Send E-mail to DMurphy@nea.org.