I live in Kansas. I am an educator. My state has just eliminated teacher licensing requirements for six school districts, including a major suburban district known for the affluence of its students. On paper, this is being spun as a positive thing. Supporters of this decision claim it will allow experts to fill teaching positions that would normally be occupied by certified generalists (those with Education degrees who have a sub-specialty, as most teachers in the state do). In reality, it is a continued assault on education in the state of Kansas. Not only does it open the door for unqualified people to assume the responsibility of managing a classroom and imparting knowledge to students, but it is a transparent effort to recruit "educators" more in line with the anti-science, anti-secular, anti-critical-thinking agenda of the Kansas GOP.

The current GOP legislature has made gutting our public education system one of its top priorities. Their school funding scheme was found unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court. Budget cuts have resulted in many smaller school districts being forced to close early, and according to friends who teach in these mostly small, rural communities, teachers are no longer permitted to charge their phones in their classroom or use a lamp at their desks, since the state needs to save electricity. Governor Sam Brownback has an open disdain for public schooling that has trickled down to the legislature. The man LOOOOVES his school vouchers, which are a handy way to direct tax money to private schools while blustering about "options."

Much of the justification for the de-certification shenanigans has come in the form of the oversimplified logic that a high degree of subject knowledge means one will automatically be a competent teacher. Apparently, an "expert" reading from a book is preferable to actual teaching. Methods, processes, and practices of education have no worth in Brownback's Kansas. In other words, nice pedagogy you've got there. Would be a shame if anything were to happen to it. It's also a slap in the face to students, who are served best by passionate, creative teachers who have been exposed to the appropriate teaching methods and practices of their discipline. The de-certification is being lauded as an "innovative" idea, as if further neutering educators is going to somehow turn Kansas into Silicon Valley. That's a pretty tough idea to buy, given the level of anti-intellectualism rampant in the state.

Teacher loathing is a time-honored practice of the extreme right. In Kansas, the proof is in the pudding: recently, thousands of Kansas teachers have retired (many in order to claim their KPERS state employee benefits before Brownback guts those too) or left the state to teach in neighboring states, like Missouri and Nebraska. There is a mass exodus of teachers from my state. Now, the GOP legislature has given the middle finger to teachers who value their craft, and a condescending pat on the head to students who deserve to learn from educators who are well-read in educational theory and praxis.

Good teachers use informed, conscious pedagogy to reach students and encourage critical thinking and adaptability to a rapidly changing world. Critical thinking is a direct threat to the fear-based mainstream media economy and the wholesale buying and selling of fear, anger, and division so vigorously championed by the right. So of course the idea of certifying teachers to use pluralistic pedagogical practices and to promote critical inquiry scares the hell out of my state's GOP leadership. Soon I will be among those thousands of teachers leaving the state for greener pastures.