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Union: Legislation an attack on teachers
By Chris Strunk
Last Updated: April 10, 2014

Bill would strip away due process rights

Legislation that was supposed to address inequities in public school funding in Kansas was instead an attack on teachers, the Valley Center teachers union and others said this week.

A bill passed during the weekend and awaiting Gov. Sam Brownback's signature strips away teachers' rights to due process procedures in termination proceedings, which some say ultimately hurts teachers' ability to advocate for students.

"Our elected officials have done little to increase funding and instead resorted to political attacks on educators," Daniel Ackland, a teacher at the Valley Center Intermediate School and president of the Valley Center National Educators Association, said in a written statement in response to inquiries from The News. "Rather than focusing on the future of Kansas (your children), they focused on attacking those that advocate every day for them. VCNEA hopes that everyone in our community will remember this come November. It will take all of us to create the change in Topeka necessary to bring back strong schools in our state."

Ackland said due process, which is granted to teachers after their third year of employment, does not mean teachers have their jobs for life. It merely means that districts must provide evidence to justify the firing of a teacher.

"Without due process rights, teachers can be let go for having different philosophies and points of view than their administrators," Ackland said. "It quiets teachers who may otherwise advocate for themselves and for students."

The public education policy change was tacked onto a bill designed to respond to the Kansas Supreme Court's directive to make education funding more equitable across school districts.

Rep. Steve Huebert, R-Valley Center, said the bill represents a compromise.

"It's the best we could do and for the most part, we can be happy with the compromise we reached," Huebert said. " … I don't like everything about the bill. But I had to work with my colleagues in the House to pass a bill. After that, we had to try to make a compromise with the Senate."

Huebert voted for the measure.

"I understand there are teachers who are upset," he said. "I also know there are teachers who understand there's a need to look at due process and make some changes because the current system doesn't work."

Huebert said the state's goal is like the local school district's goal --- "have quality teachers in every classroom."

"The current process doesn't work in dealing with poor-performing teachers," Huebert said "This will allow local districts to set up a due process system in their negotiations with teachers. … The issue has been worked on for years. It's not like it was just thrown together."

Sen. Carolyn McGinn, R-Sedgwick, voted against the legislation.

"I see this as a personal attack on teachers," she said.

McGinn said some legislators don't understand the due process system for K-12 teachers.

"We don't have tenure in this state. We don't," she said. "…The bottom line is, principals and superintendents have the ability to fire a teacher and all they have to do, just like a business, is write them up, put it in their file, and if it's a continuing problem, they can fire a teacher. … Taking away their ability to have a hearing, I think, is wrong."

McGinn said the Legislature should have passed a clean bill, one that dealt with funding and not policy.

"We had an equalization problem that we were supposed to try to fix for the court," she said. "I didn't hear anything in the court's interpretation that we needed to deal with policy changes."

Valley Center Superintendent Cory Gibson said HB 2605 could mean more than $700,000 in additional funds for the Valley Center school district next school year.

"This is a big win for us, but the challenge is, it's not going to help much with operations," he said. "We have a lot of needs with facilities, but it's not going to help a ton with the operational side."

Addressing the policy issues in the bill, Gibson said the district is taking a wait-and-see approach for now. He said the bill is unclear as to which teachers elimination of the due process rights will affect --- current teachers or ones hired after the law goes into effect.

"If due process is ever removed, we would convene a team to discuss our options as a district," Gibson said. "If we had a teacher who wasn't doing their job, we would go through the process. … Teachers, in this district at least, shouldn't feel that things are going to change. We'll have the same process."

Valley Center has 100 tenured teachers, who have worked longer than three years, and 57 who aren't tenured.

Following state law, the district conducts performance reviews for teachers twice a year for the first two years, once a year for the next two years and every third year after that.

If reviews show unsatisfactory performance, a rigorous plan of improvement is put into place, Gibson said.

The district has not had a due process firing in at least eight years, when the district ultimately lost a case that went to third-party arbitration.

Some administrators --- and teachers --- say it's difficult to fire teachers who are tenured, setting up a long and expensive process.

Ackland said the Valley Center school district is fortunate because it has a team of administrators and school board members who "all possess high integrity."

"They are truly out to do what is best for students," he said. "They listen to input from all stakeholders. Sadly, this may not be the case in every school district."





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