Thu May 17 2012
As state lawmakers near the end of their 60-day session next week, the fate of key education legislation is up in the air.
Lawmakers are scheduled to reconvene in Frankfort Wednesday for a two-day wrap-up session. Their focus will be passing a $17 billion, two-year budget by the April 15 deadline, but high-profile education bills are still on the table.
Charter schools
The push for charter school legislation was renewed last week after the federal Department of Education announced Delaware and Tennessee would receive up to $609 million from the Race to the Top fund for innovative education reform.
On Thursday, lawmakers amended House Bill 109 - implementing “response to intervention” tutoring for kindergarten through third-graders - to include charter schools.
Charter schools are funded with taxpayer money, but operate independently from local school boards.
The bill, which the House passed 94-1 before the amendment was added, barely escaped the Senate 19-18.
Kentucky was one of 16 finalists for Race to the Top money, but the only state to earn zero points for charter schools, Kentucky Education Commissioner Terry Holliday said on his blog last week.
Worth a possible 32 points, charter school legislation could have landed Kentucky in the second-place spot, he said.
Dropout age
A bill that would raise the minimum dropout age to 18 has stalled, despite support from the governor, first lady Jane Beshear and NBA legend Magic Johnson, who appeared in Frankfort in February to speak in its favor.
House lawmakers voted 94-6 for the bill, but it awaits Senate approval.
That’s unlikely, Senate President David Williams told the Herald-Leader last week, because several senators are concerned about the cost of keeping at-risk students in school.
But several pieces of legislation that could affect local schools have cleared both the House and Senate.
Suicide prevention
Two bills relate to suicide-prevention training for teachers and students.
House Bill 51, signed into law in March, requires every public middle and high school distribute suicide-prevention information to all students by Sept. 1 each year, beginning in 2010.
The Cabinet for Health and Family Services must also post the information on its Web site by Aug. 1.
Wayne Dominick, communications coordinator for Franklin County Public Schools, said local educators already talk to kids about suicide prevention, but the new law will expand the instruction.
“It will just add a dimension to what we are already doing,” he said.
Frankfort Independent Superintendent Rich Crowe said Frankfort Middle/High School doesn’t provide suicide-prevention information to all students, but works with individual students as needed.
Senate Bill 65, which awaits Gov. Steve Beshear’s signature, requires principals, guidance counselors and teachers to complete at least two hours of instruction in suicide prevention each school year.
School psychologists are trained in suicide prevention, Dominick said, and they typically advise teachers as needed.
“The big thing is how it’s going to be funded,” he said. “We can use some of the professional development time we already have, but if we have to get materials it’s going to put a strain on the budget.”
$2,000 for certification
A $2,000 annual salary bonus for National Board Certified teachers has been extended to faculty at career and technical centers. The governor signed the bill into law March 30.
Franklin County Public Schools employs 30 teachers with the advanced credential, which can take one to three years to complete. Twenty more plan to apply later this year.
But Dominick says none of those teachers work at the Franklin County Career and Technical Center, where students learn skills like auto repair, welding and health sciences.
“They haven’t pursued it because there hasn’t been that stipend,” he said. “I’m sure that those guys are more than capable of attaining that certification, and maybe more of them will go after it now.”
Money for the stipend comes from state funds, Dominick said, so the change won’t affect Franklin County financially.
Legislators also voted in another bill to extend a $2,000 stipend to speech-language pathologists, who help children with vocal communication skills.
The pay bonus could cost the state $1.7 million annually if all 858 of the speech-language pathologists working in Kentucky schools qualified. There are eight to 12 speech-language pathologists working in FCPS, Dominick said.
But House Bill 376 says the stipend will only be paid if the General Assembly appropriates funding – unless local school boards choose to pick up the tab.
That could be a problem, Dominick said, if the legislature appropriates funding and takes it away later. The bill cleared both the House and Senate with nearly unanimous support, but Beshear has yet to sign it.
“It’s hard to take money back from people once the General Assembly gives it to them,” he said.
Crowe agreed.
He compared it to the addition of two school days by the legislature several years ago, which House lawmakers cut in their budget proposal. House Speaker Greg Stumbo said school districts could continue to pay for the two days from their own funds.
Teachers would see the loss of a $2,000 stipend as a pay cut, Crowe said.
“I don’t like it, simply because if they (General Assembly) do have the money now, what’s going to happen two years later when they don’t?”
Behind closed doors
A measure to allow school board members to meet in private to conduct annual superintendent evaluations awaits Beshear’s signature.
Members of the Franklin County and Frankfort Independent boards of education have said they support the legislation because it allows for open and honest discussion about superintendents’ job performance.
But Ashley Pack, general counsel for the Kentucky Press Association, argued it would keep “critical information” from the public.
Senate Bill 178 requires the annual evaluation be “discussed and adopted in an open meeting” and any written reports must be made available to the public. But school boards can have “preliminary discussions” in closed session.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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