Staff Editorial—
The administration has decided to implement a policy limiting each teacher to five years of teaching an AP or IB course, at which point another teacher would take over the responsibility of teaching the course.
This policy attempts to address a problem that does not exist. Few, if any, cases exist where underqualified teachers are instructing AP or IB classes that fail to prepare them for end-of-year tests and give them the knowledge the course is designed to give.
This idea ignores a goal for which every school should strive: having every instructor teach the course or courses that maximizes the benefit for students. If a particular teacher is passionate about statistics, economics, art or any other field for which an AP or IB course is offered, why should they teach a different course after an arbitrary number of years have passed? Why should the administration choose a blanket rule for the amount of time any teacher can teach any course? The teacher of any class should be determined by merit.
There is also something to be gained from having a teacher repeat the same material for many years. They learn what material students find difficult; they anticipate which ideas and concepts to emphasize; they know which units require more time than others. When teachers do this they make a class more efficient and give students a better learning experience.
And teachers get used to teaching in a particular style. A teacher who teaches an on-level course that switches to AP may not maintain the rigor that an AP class should have, and a reverse situation can occur when an AP teacher switches to an on-level course.
This is not to say a different teacher should not ever take over the class from the hands of a veteran. However, those changes shouldn’t occur due to some arbitrary time limit that the administration decides is appropriate. Instead, it should occur when another teacher can bring something new to the class that challenges and instructs its students.
To us, that seems to be a far superior situation.