With Click of the Mouse, 1,100 Chicago Teachers Discharged

More than 1,100 Chicago teachers won’t be returning to their jobs in the fall, now that principals in the city’s school district are using a new system that makes dismissing ineffective educators a lot easier.

If teachers have been working there less than four years, and don’t have tenure, principals can simply use a computer program to choose one of six reasons why they don’t want those employees back for another school year. Administrators were allowed to choose more than one reason.

More than half—55 percent—of the 1,116 teachers were let go because they had problems managing their classrooms or they struggled in their relationships with students, according...