The Tacoma (Washington) News Tribune editorialized last week about a middle school principal convicted of third-degree rape who’s still drawing $8,245 a month in salary because the state’s due process laws have thus far prevented his district from firing him.

Unfortunately, The News Tribune undermines its own case by claiming that tenure protections are the right way to protect “educators and other public employees from arbitrary, groundless firings by vindictive or incompetent administrators”. Thing is, it’s the very same tenure protections (defended by teachers unions, including the Washington Education Association) that keep bad administrators from getting the ax!

Raise the bar on teachers and administrators — our current laws let bad teachers hang on to their jobs and let administrators (bad or not) shirk responsibility for teacher quality.

(HT: Joanne Jacobs)