Firing a Teacher for Doing Something Legal - Essay Example

The right or the freedom of speech and expression demands that one should be allowed to freely express their views as long as they do not infringe upon the rights of other people by expressing their views. By sacking teachers for something legal that they do in their private time, the school districts deny teachers the freedom to freely and legally express their views. For instance, in Turley’s article, we learn that a Philadelphia high school teacher was sacked because of a posting to her blog in which the teacher had complained of the lazy and careless behavior of her students. Given the fact that the teacher’s blog post was general and was not targeted at any particular student, the teacher had not violated any rights of her students. For this reason, therefore, by sacking the teacher, the school district acted improperly and denied the teacher the freedom to freely express her views.

The second reason why I believe school districts should not sack teachers because of something they do in personal time is that sacking teacher for something they do in their private time are an infringement on the teachers’ privacy. In Turley’s article, for instance, we learn that in the year 2010, an unidentified teacher in Pennsylvania was suspended after a third party posted a picture on Facebook showing her with a male stripper at a bridal shower. By suspending the teacher because of the picture that she had been taken with a male stripper at a party, the school district infringed upon the privacy of the teacher. This is because the teacher has the right to live her private life in whichever way she wishes as long as she does not violate the rights of other people.

The third reason why I believe that school districts should not sack teachers for the legal things that they do in their private life is that human beings change their behavior with time; a person may be a thief today, but tomorrow the person may decide to stop stealing and to become a good person. In Turley’s article, we are given an example of a high school teacher, Stacie Halas, who was placed on administrative leave when the school administration learned that Halas was a porn actress before becoming a teacher. Such an action shows that the school district did not believe that Halas could have changed her behavior and abandoned acting pornography. The fact of the matter, however, could have been that Halas had abandoned acting pornography a long time ago before becoming a teacher. For that reason, therefore, I believe that sacking teachers for their private past life are unjustifiable. Read More