In the recent case of Weston v. Indep. School Dist. No. 35 of Cherokee County, 2007 OK 61, the parties received a lesson in the vagaries of appellate "standard of review" in a teacher discharge case. In that case, a "career" teacher was dismissed by the board of education for the Tahlequah Public School system for "institutional ineffectiveness" and "unsatisfactory teaching performance."
The teacher had apparently been approached by the principal regarding his teaching methods; the principal told the teacher of his plans to "make him a better teacher." The principal had reviewed some of the teacher's previous test scores, and had some concerns, even though the teacher was not shown the test scores in question. The principal suggested that the teacher inprove his particular methodology by instituting a methodology known as "Teaching for Internalization." The method apparently involves: stating objectives, reviewing learned material, involving the learners, restating the objectives, restating the lesson's relevance to past learning and sutdents' experiences, and then summarizing.
Even though the teacher's teaching methods thereafter received satisfactory ratings, the principal recommended that he not be rehired. The superintendent gave him additional time to complete his efforts to improve, but subsequently concurred in the principal's recommendation. The school board agreed, and dismissed the teacher on the grounds of unsatisfactor teaching performance and institutional ineffectiveness.
The teacher petitioned for a new trial before a district court pursuant to 70 O.S. sec. 6-101.27. The section provides for de novo review of the school board's decision; no deference is given to the school board's findings and conclusions. The trial court found that the teacher had substantially complied with the principal's recommendations, and that the test results from students in his class were not substantially different than those of students in other classes.
The Court of Civil Appeals, however, found that the issue was not whether the teacher had complied with the plan of improvement, but whether his teaching was unsatisfactory or ineffective, and that the school board had made an appropriate decision.
(Interestingly, the district court failed to memorialize its findings in a journal entry, but merely read them into the record. After all of the appellate briefing was complete, the Court of Civil Appeals ordered the trial court to enter written findings of fact and conclusions of law, and thereafter supplement the appellate record with the findings. After the new findings were included in the appellate record, the Court of Civil Appeals allowed the parties to submit supplemental briefing related to the written findings. On certiorari, the Oklahoma Supreme Court held this to be an appropriate procedure.)
The Supreme Court of Oklahoma reversed and found that the appellate standard of review effectively prevented the Court of Civil Appeals from reversing the trial court's de novo review of the school board's decision. The Court noted that the standard before the court on appeal is "whether there is any compentent evidence to support the trial court's decision." The appellate court is prohibited from weighing the evidence. Only if the decision was clearly erroneous as a matter of law may the trial judge's findings not be accepted.
The Court also noted the importance of the teacher tenure law, finding that it "was intended to give job security to competent and qualified teachers and to protect them from dismissal or non-renewal for political, personal, arbitrary or discriminatory reasons." Tenure status grants teachers "substantive rights in their continued position." The Court ultimately held that the standard of review required affirmance of the trial court's decision:
There was testimony on Mr. Weston's behalf from a number of former students and their parents. Eighteen parents and students testified, in almost one-hundred pages of testimony, praising Weston's teaching and his effectiveness as a teacher. Students testified that they were not bored in class, that they had worked on special projects and had worked in groups, etc., in contradiction to the assertions of the administration. Those parents and students who were asked why they came to testify for Mr. Weston responded, variously, that it was because he was a good teacher, they did not believe that he should have been fired and they were surprised to learn that he had been fired. School District attempted to discredit their testimony because all of the students who testified made As and Bs in Mr. Weston's classes, suggesting that they were not representative. The burden, however, was on the School Board, who could have called as witnesses students or parents of students who felt adversely affected by Weston's teaching, which was one of the charges leveled at Weston.
The trial judge weighs the evidence and determines the credibility of witnesses and the weight to be given to their testimony. The trial judge applied the correct standard under the Teacher Due Process Act and found that the school district had failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the teacher should be dismissed on the grounds of instructional ineffectiveness and unsatisfactory teacher performance. Because there was competent evidence supporting the trial judge's decision, it will be affirmed on appeal.
