> Nah, it's an institutional problem; you'd solve it with slightly different rules about how schools are run. For instance, you could give principals more autonomy over hiring/firing teachers but make it harder to fire THEM, thereby reducing the ability of nitwit politicians to exert pressure to fire particular people. You could make more of the relevant intermediary jobs (like state superintendent) nonpartisan, and make being nonpartisan an explicit part of the job. You could add more transparency to hiring/firing decisions and leave it to the voters to punish politicians who do that sort of thing - if regular elections aren't enough disincentive, then add a petition-based recall process.
The voters vote these people in intentionally. They campaign on it.
> Or you could recognize that political sea changes at the local level don't happen often enough for this to be a significant problem, so we shouldn't worry about it until and unless it actually happens. Don't institute cures that are worse than the disease. (The fact that some district in Texas has this problem doesn't mean you need tenure everywhere in the country.)
I suggest you employ Google. Its a frequent problem in the South, not just Texas.
> Though the real solution is more student autonomy. Let parents decide which schools to send their kids to rather than arbitrarily assigning them to a specific one and the whole issue basically goes away. If parents don't like what's being taught to their kids, make it easy for them to go elsewhere or teach the kids at home and they don't NEED to get rid of bad teachers. (When people don't like what's served at a restaurant, they don't typically lobby to fire the cook, they just eat somewhere else! Because they CAN.)
Fundamentally, the purpose of a school system is to benefit the students, not the teachers. If you want to convince people tenure is a good idea, you need to make the case from that perspective - why it helps the students. Otherwise it just sounds like special pleading.
And when people like you are willing to pay the full cost, including an externalities beyond just the price of tuition on everyone involved, sure.
Strangely, people seem to pretend that they don't exist and/or balk at the full price tag.
It is alot like the USPS. Even UPS and Fedex don't want its unprofitable routes in rural areas because they can't be made profitable. The problem is, when you rip away the profitable portion of the process, it ends up costing the taxpayer just as much when the bill comes due.
If you want vouchers, you need to fund every child equally...including the fact they may live in the wrong neighborhood. You don't get to say "Too bad, kid, you live in Compton. No one can get you to a good school on time unless we gave you more than every other kid."