Read H4662 which proposes changed to the Education Accountability Act of 1998

Read comments from the September 6, 2007 Committee Hearing

Read the Op-ed piece by Charles Vaughan. 

Read about the May 30, 2007 Social Studies Summit

House Bill 4662. Cynthia Stroud and Jane Eason attended the House Education subcommittee meeting on Tuesday, 12 February 2008.   Public comment on house Bill 4662 to revise EAA 1998 was solicited at the beginning of the meeting. Two school superintendents spoke about how unfair the current rating for schools/districts is, therefore they supported this new bill. 

President-elect Dr. Jane Eason spoke and was asked to be brief since she spoke last week. She reiterated the importance of social studies in accountability. Chairman Whitmire thanked me for the comments and publicly thanked us for the tea. For the benefit of the entire group, I said, "I do hope you enjoy your tea, and please do not dump Social Studies from accountability!"  Everyone chuckled. 

State Board of Education Chairperson, Kristin Maguire spoke and asked that formative assessment not be required, allowing districts the flexibility to use formative assessments as they see fit.

After public comments, Rep. Anthony (the coach and former teacher) introduced 4 or 5 amendments. One of his amendments was to ELIMINATE SS from Testing!! It did not pass. The vote was 2 for and 4 against every time. Rep. Branham voted with him each time.  Please e-mail Representative Nathan Ballentine, Chairman William R. Whitmire, Representative Carl Gullick, Representative Mike Gambrell, as they voted against each amendment from Rep. Anthony. They need our thanks! (Actually Rep. A. had a few good amendments but it was all staged and political, to vote against the amendments. Rep. A. even said "I know the chairman has asked you to vote against these amendments and that is okay, the real "non-bill" was much better. This is all political football." ) 

Dr. Eason spoke with  Representative Anthony afterwards about why he was against social studies testing. He said he is answering a call to reduce testing. Dr. Eason explained to him that PACT social studies testing takes only about 50 - 70 minutes once a year, in a 180 day schedule. That is not too much testing. She went on to explain that teachers may be reporting too much testing but that is from elementary teachers complaining about district benchmarks/diagnostic/MAPS.

The full committee meets tomorrow (2/13), one hour and a half after adjournment, probably about 2:00 or so. H4662 is last on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting.