So the House Public Education committee met this morning, with one glaring absence on the agenda: House Bill 3, the new take on school accountability.
Lawmakers and staff were expecting to bring the new version up for discussion today. So what happened? A quick call to committee staff confirmed that they are still working on it, but the sheer volume of response, criticism, suggestions and concerns about the bill (especially on forced re-purposing and the new two-tier diploma system) has taken longer than expected. The bill drafter is in daily contact with staff and lawmakers, and the hope is for a new draft early next week, possibly Monday.
No-one is necessarily happy that a bill that came out of almost a year and a half of public consultation still needs all that public input to fix. That said, Public Ed Chair Rob Eissler, R-The Woodlands, is getting full marks in many quarters for saying the bill isn’t ready for prime time, and then living up to his promise of a heavy, heavy re-write.
This article appears in April 3 • 2009.
