Recently, the Kansas Governor passed a plan to get rid of tenure and dismissal for teachers. In doing so he sparked a fire that is growing to huge proportions.

“Now they can fire you but they don’t have to tell you why, which was one of the advantages of tenure,” Spanish teacher Katie Marten said. “I’m not happy with it but at the same time if you are doing your job and trying your hardest you shouldn’t have to worry about getting fired but I guess that’s what the problem is. Because now they don’t have to tell you why.”

Before, teachers would be given a warning and the teachers would be told what they needed to fix and be given time to fix whatever the problem was and only if that teacher made no effort to solve the problem then the teachers could be fired. Now teachers could be fired without a documented reason, teachers also could have no chance to argue their case to the board of education.

“I feel the legislature and the government is attacking the educational system that seems to have done a pretty good job of educating them and as teachers we don’t understand why they are attacking public education,” Math teacher Mike Curran said. “effectively what they have done is told teacher play it safe. That way you get to keep your jobs so don’t try anything new which might fail don’t set high goals or standards for students. Make sure that everyone gets good grades so that way no one fails, and so you can keep your job. Sounds like a pretty poor way to run an educational system.”

Stakes are high and opinions are flying as the seriousness of the situation sinks in.

“I didn’t think there was anything wrong with it before,”  BHS principal Rob McKim said. “I didn’t think there was a reason to get rid of it. I’m not in favor of what they did, I didn’t think it was necessary, I think it will hurt school morale. I think it can stifle or inhibit teacher creativity trying new things. There is an element to new that opens up for something not going well. I taught math for 15 years and in those 15 years I changed how I was going to instruct something even though what I had done previously had done fairly well. And I know for me if there was a concern that ‘hey if that doesn’t work well they can say your not a very good teacher’ that would concern me.”

Some teachers think that people do not know the depth of what has been done.

“The general public has a complete misconception of what due process is for a teacher,” Science teacher Scott Crenshaw said. “It doesn’t protect a teacher from losing their job. It allows a teacher to speak freely on behalf of teacher and students both, without fear of retribution. To take that away in essence silences the voice of teachers because of the risk of termination.”

In taking away due process and tenure the governor has started a battle of education that could change more than they planned on.