Education reform attacked
It has been state Senate Majority Leader Dan Kelly's long-term mission to sabotage the nationally praised education reform program that emerged from the 1990 General Assembly and remains one of the state legislature's historic achievements.
The last great assault came in 1998, and it was beaten back only with furious counterattack and a few tactical concessions.
This year Mr. Kelly is joined by Senate President David Williams in attempting to blunt the thrust of the Kentucky Education Reform Act, by passing Senate Bill 1.
It is difficult to overstate the damage this bill would inflict. Most important, it would undo the accountability that's based on the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System. CATS would be replaced with national tests that are not based on the Kentucky curriculum, would not test higher learning skills, would defy the KERA precept that every student can become proficient and would place Kentucky athwart the No Child Left Behind Act.
Most devastating would be the effective removal of portfolios from the accountability system, because writing is the capstone skill with which students demonstrate their ability to gather, interpret and communicate information and ideas. To ensure that writing gets less emphasis in classrooms across Kentucky would be a real travesty...
...Some of those appearing to join the Kelly-Williams attack should remember that there are political consequences, because many Kentuckians are proud of KERA's successes, and proud of the progress Kentucky students have made. Voters will take note of those like Sen. Tim Shaughnessy, D-Louisville, who embolden the anti-KERA offensive by insisting "there's nothing wrong with revisiting, revising and updating the accountability system." Shame on Mr. Shaughnessy. He knows full well the intent is to subvert.
Education Commissioner Jon Draud can't let SB 1 go unchallenged. Mr. Draud's defenders, at the time of his controversial rushed appointment, said he is a school man, first and foremost. If so, he can't sit on his hands now. A shroud of neutrality won't cover his culpability if he refuses to stand up to SB 1. He's a former superintendent. He knows it was wrong, as Marion County Superintendent Roger Marcum points out, to push "a major change in where we're going without consulting educators."
Sen. Williams, presumably with a straight face, calls the proposed SB1 sabotage of KERA a "natural progression." That must mean be thinks all good things must come to an end.
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