Twitter Facebook LinkedIn Flipboard 0 In higher education, tenure is a professor’s contractual right not to have his or her position terminated without just cause. Tenure was formally introduced in the U.S. in 1915 by the A.A.U.P. in their Declaration of Principle on Academic Freedom and Academic Tenure. Tenure provides professors an incredible layer of job security, and it protects the academic freedom of experienced professors. Firing a tenured professor is almost unheard of. Tenure exists because people have been killed for their teachings. The Athenian philosopher Socrates, for example, was convicted of heresy for denying the gods and corrupting the young through his teachings. He chose to be put to death by drinking hemlock (poison), although his students were willing to help him escape. A professor of Math and Science at the University of Pisa, Galileo Galilei did not have his contract renewed due to experiments critical of Aristotle. He was later convicted of heresy for claiming the Earth revolved around the sun. Tenured professors are expensive—their average annual salary is $95,224. The average annual salary of of non-tenured full-time professors, in comparison, is $85,973. It’s quite possible for tenured professors to become lazy and inflexible over time, as they possess so much job security. Also, “students learn relatively more from non-tenure line professors in their introductory courses,” according to the National Bureau of Economic Research at Northwestern University. To learn more about how tenure empowers bad teachers to thrive, check out the infographic below. Source: BestDegreePrograms.org Twitter Tweet Facebook Share Email This article was written for Business 2 Community by Kane Pepi.Learn how to publish your content on B2C Author: Kane Pepi Kane Pepi is an experienced financial and cryptocurrency writer with over 2,000+ published articles, guides, and market insights in the public domain. Expert niche subjects include asset valuation and analysis, portfolio management, and the prevention of financial crime. Kane is particularly skilled in explaining complex financial topics in a user-friendly … View full profile ›More by this author:VoIP Basics: Everything Beginners Should Know!Bitcoin Investment, Trading & Mining: The Ultimate Guide for BeginnersIs This a Better Way to Set Your 2020 Goals and Resolutions?