We suppose protecting one's flanks is a desirable thing to do when you're in a position of power that requires, by design, exposure to vulnerability every four years, i.e., standing for re-election.
Politicians for, well, forever have spent as much time thinking about defending themselves from criticism as they have advancing reasons voters should support them. Insecurities come in many forms, not the least of which is being new to a job or lacking the experience yet to be able to crow about any proven capacity to get that job done.
The lower the level of one's inner confidence, the greater the extremes one may be willing to go in attempting to minimize weaknesses in his or her defenses, real or perceived. Politicians who fear criticism and thus use their authority to quell dissent before it even gets started spend far too much energy worried about shadows. Their energy is better spent delivering the leadership they touted in their election campaigns and letting the chips fall. If what you're doing is what's best for the people you represent, those chips will fall just fine in most cases.
With that preface, we come to the current process to select an educator to be named Arkansas Teacher of the Year. Sarah Huckabee Sanders' administration has revised the 2024 application for the honor to require its potential recipients to write about the LEARNS Act.
That, of course, is Sanders' premiere piece of legislation out of this year's session of the General Assembly. It gave starting teachers big raises to $50,000 a year, but also controversially revised state law so public tax dollars can be used to pay private school tuition, made it easier to fire teachers and puts less emphasis on experience. It also created a bonus some teachers will qualify for that rewards good performance in the job or willingness to teach in a subject matter or part of the state that needs teachers.
The act also will bar students, with some exceptions, who fail to meet reading requirements from advancing from the third grade and provides for adding literacy coaches and grants for families to hire tutors to help students with reading.
The LEARNS Act has been challenged in court and a petition drive under way to place its repeal on a future election ballot.
But to even have a chance to be considered as a teacher of the year, educators have to respond to a couple of new questions: How will you implement the LEARNS legislation into your classroom practice? What positive impact do you expect LEARNS to have for Arkansas students?
In other words, there's really no way you could be a teacher of enough caliber to deserve consideration as the teacher of the year unless you embrace the governor's controversial reforms.
Because the teacher of the year gets a year off to serve as an advocate for teachers and students, it's not a new thing that nominees are asked questions about issues they believe to be important to public education. In the past, the state's application has, however, been more generic, leaving room for the applicant to identify and expound on the matters he or she would use as a platform during the award year. It's a little like Miss America contestants articulating an issue they'd like to address during their one-year reign should they be selected for the crown.
In the past, the state didn't use the teacher of the year application to paint candidates into a corner of being an advocate for a governor's specific ideas or legislation.
What all this looks like from here is an effort by Sanders and her staff to shield the administration from anyone who might differ on the governor's strategy for the state's public education system. Have an opinion that suggests Sanders is going down the wrong path? Fine, have that opinion, but you're not worthy of consideration for such a lofty award.
Perhaps the name of the award shouldn't be Teacher of the Year. Maybe Governor's Advocate for Education Policy would be more accurate.
This sort of state-sponsored -- not Sanders-sponsored -- recognition should not be dependent on an educator's political beliefs. But if they disagree with Sanders, how can they be good educators, right?
The prescription for a non-politicized teacher of the year award is thicker skin in the governor's office and enough confidence that whatever criticisms come, the governor's leadership can deflect them. If they're not sure of that in the governor's office, if they advance policies that can't withstand scrutiny from teachers in the trenches, perhaps it's time for them to pose a few tough questions to themselves.
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NoneWhats the point?
Questions to gauge a nominees backing of the governors policies dont belong on Arkansas Teacher of the Year applications.