Court Opinion

ID: 9723031
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:00:41.654043+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:44.128223
License: Public Domain

Levin, J.
(dissenting). The question presented is whether the plaintiffs, tenured school teachers, acquired position-specific tenure as counselors with the defendant school district and thus were wrongfully laid off when they were replaced by tenured *593teachers with greater seniority who did not have position-specific tenure as counselors.
I would hold that the teacher tenure act1 contemplates that each school district may determine whether the employment contract it enters into shall exclude position-specific tenure for a non-classroom position, and that the plaintiffs were wrongfully laid off because the employment contracts with the plaintiffs did not exclude such tenure.
i
Plaintiffs, Patricia Belanger, Helen Hanley, Bonnie Zervas, and Norma Stanbury, were tenured teachers who were assigned counseling positions with the defendant Warren Consolidated School District. In 1981, the school district laid off a number of teachers. Plaintiffs were laid off and tenured teachers with greater seniority, who had not theretofore been employed as counselors, assumed their positions.2
The plaintiffs appealed to the Tenure Commission which found that they had tenure only as classroom teachers and not as counselors. The circuit court, on appeal, reversed, holding that plaintiffs were entitled to tenure as counselors absent a tenure exclusion in their employment contracts. The Court of Appeals affirmed.3 I would affirm.
ii
The teacher tenure act provides that after com*594pletion of a probationary period, a teacher shall be employed continuously and shall not be dismissed or demoted except as specified in the act.4 The act further provides that a teacher "employed other than as a classroom teacher, including but not limited to, a superintendent, assistant superintendent, principal, department head or director of curriculum” shall be deemed to have been granted continuing tenure in such capacity unless the contract of employment provides otherwise, in which event a teacher who is employed other than as a classroom teacher shall be granted continuing tenure as an active classroom teacher.5
The contracts of employment with the plaintiff teachers did not exclude their acquiring tenure as counselors. The question presented thus narrows to whether a tenured teacher employed as a counselor is "employed other than as a classroom teacher” within the meaning of the act and acquires position-specific tenure absent a contrary provision in the contract of employment.
In Smiley v Grand Blanc Bd of Ed, 416 Mich 316, 327; 330 NW2d 416 (1982), this Court, in holding that teachers who had been originally *595employed under contracts excluding position-specific tenure had not acquired such tenure, quoted with approval the explanation in Goodwin v Kalamazoo Bd of Ed, 82 Mich App 559, 566, 568; 267 NW2d 142 (1978), of the "underlying philosophy” of the act. The Court of Appeals there had held that a tenured classroom teacher employed as the director of buildings and grounds had acquired position-specific tenure.
The Court, in Goodwin, said that the statute authorizes "individual school districts to determine which administrative positions should carry tenure.” The statute does not, said the Court, "dictate categories of administrative positions which carry tenure as a matter of law.” The Court said that "[i]n view of the wide range and size of school districts, the statute enables local school boards to tailor their administrative tenure policies accordingly. The statute does not attempt to dictate uniform tenure policies for administrators in all school districts.” Since the contract with the plaintiff as director of buildings and grounds did not deny him tenure, he had achieved position-specific tenure.
The decision whether to allow position-specific tenure to a tenured teacher is to be determined under the act as a matter of contract between the teacher and the school board. I agree with the Court of Appeals, "One school board may wish to allow its counselors to gain tenure while another may not.”
The school district and amicus curiae teacher unions contend that it is unwise and unfair from a policy standpoint to lay off a classroom teacher with greater seniority than a counselor who has acquired position-specific tenure. It appears that the school district and the union have implemented that view by providing, in a collective *596bargaining agreement entered into after the plaintiffs were laid off, that a member of the bargaining unit who has not previously attained tenure in a position other than as a classroom teacher shall not be deemed to have position-specific tenure for a nonclassroom position, but shall be deemed to have tenure as an active classroom teacher. School districts that wish to enter into such agreements may do so. I would decline to impose that policy preference on school districts that do not agree with that policy by adopting a construction of the act contrary to the "underlying philosophy” stated in Smiley and Goodwin.
iii
The Tenure Commission created its own functional definition of "classroom teacher,” stating that a classroom teacher is a person whose "primary duties involve instruction or guidance of students,” and declared that counselors are classroom teachers because they provide instruction and guidance to students.6 Neither the Tenure Commission nor the school district have pointed to anything in the language of the act or the history of its enactment that supports substituting a functional definition for a literal definition of "classroom teacher.”
The Tenure Commission’s functional definition ignores altogether the word "classroom.” A coun*597selor’s office is not a classroom or a classroom setting. The Tenure Commission’s functional definition also ignores the general meaning of the word "teacher” to the extent it would encompass the function of a person who only occasionally and generally infrequently provides "guidance” or "instruction” to a particular student.
I agree with the circuit judge and the Court of Appeals that the term "classroom teacher” does not include a person who, while offering instruction and guidance to students, does not teach or provide instruction in a classroom setting.7
The school district would limit the term "other than as a classroom teacher” to persons performing administrative duties. 1963 PA 242, which expanded the authority of the school board to grant position-specific tenure by adding the words "other than as a classroom teacher, including but not limited to” before the words "superintendent, assistant superintendent [or] principal,” struck the words "in such administrative capacity” thereby indicating that position-specific tenure could be granted a nonclassroom teacher who did not have administrative duties.
I would affirm the Court of Appeals.

 MCL 38.71 et seq.; MSA 15.1971 et seq.

 It is not asserted that the pertinent collective bargaining agreement addressed the specific question here presented. It appears that a subsequent collective bargaining agreement bars a member of the bargaining unit who has not previously attained tenure in a position other than as a classroom teacher from obtaining position-specific tenure.

 Unpublished opinion per curiam of the Court of Appeals, decided April 1, 1987 (Docket No. 89833).

 After the satisfactory completion of the probationary period, a teacher shall be employed continuously by the controlling board under which the probationary period has been completed, and shall not be dismissed or demoted except as specified in this act. If the controlling board shall provide in a contract of employment of any teacher employed other than as a classroom teacher, including but not limited to, a superintendent, assistant superintendent, principal, department head or director of curriculum, made with such teacher after the completion of the probationary period, that such teacher shall not be deemed to be granted continuing tenure in such capacity by virtue of such contract of employment, then such teacher shall not be granted tenure in such capacity, but shall be deemed to have been granted continuing tenure as an active classroom teacher in such school district. [MCL 38.91; MSA 15.1991.]

 Id.

 The Tenure Commission also said that the term “other than as a classroom teacher” excludes any position that carries a specific certification requirement. The State Board of Education has established a specific certification requirement for counselors. There is not, however, such a limitation in the act.
In an earlier decision, Leonard v Center Line, unpublished opinion of the Tenure Commission decided December 22, 1982 (Docket No. 81 TC 82), the Tenure Commission had held that the counselors there had acquired position-specific tenure.

 This would, of course, include a gymnasium, a laboratory, a wood- or metal-working shop or other place that a class meets.