High standard for teacher dismissal

sometimes even while acknowledging that those characteristics were little in evidence during the hearings. In one case, for example, the school district brought charges of incompetence against a teacher who had received three consecutive annual ratings of “ nsatisfactory,” presenting exhaustive proof of the teacher’s dismal teaching performance over a three-year period. Based on a detailed record of three years of extensive rehabilitation efforts, the school district’s lawyer argued that “no amount of rehabilitation could help the [teacher’s] pedagogical problems.” The Hearing Officer upheld the teacher’s three “ nsatisfactory” ratings, writing that he was finally persuaded that “termination is the only appropriate penalty.” The reason he provided to support this decision, however, was not the teacher’s three years of abysmal performance, but rather the teacher’s attitude towards improving. As he explained, he decided to dismiss the teacher because the teacher had shown “little or no effort on his part to improve,” despite the school’s extraordinary efforts over several years.

High standard for teacher dismissal

Of the penalties that Hearing Officers are authorized to impose, dismissal is viewed as extraordinarily severe: it is “the ‘capital punishment’ of labor disputes,” in the words of one Hearing Officer.32 In a typical case, for example, the Hearing Officer rejected discharge as a “draconian penalty” for a teacher who was found to have hit a student with an electrical cord and punched him in the face.33 Teacher dismissal is ordered only as a last-resort penalty in cases of extreme misconduct, after the application of “progressive discipline” and years of efforts to rehabilitate the teacher. (See page 24 for a summary of penalties allocated.)

teacher’s proven record of teaching incompetence, in and of itself, is not a fireable

offense. One Hearing Officer described the nature of the “most serious offenses” which may potentially warrant dismissal, none of which relate to a teacher’s professional competence: Some offenses are sufficiently serious to justify serious discipline for a first offense. These include theft, physical attacks, willful and serious safety breaches, gross insubordination, and significant violations of law on the employer’s time or premises. 34

32 Case no. 4972 (2005), p. 14 33 Case no. 5062 (2005), p. 18 34 Case no. 5124 (2005), p. 37, italics added