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Legislative Column - Feb. 27, 2014 |
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Education remains on the forefront of debate in the Missouri Senate. This week we worked long hours discussing and giving final passage to a bill addressing the way students transfer from unaccredited to accredited districts and how our state classifies the status of individual schools within these districts. Senate Bill 493 would allow our state to accredit individual schools within each district as unaccredited, provisionally accredited, accredited or accredited with distinction; 55 percent of a district's schools would have to be considered unaccredited before the State Board of Education could classify an entire district as unaccredited. Currently, if one school fails in a district, then the entire district is considered unaccredited. Students would have to live in their school district and in the boundaries of their school for 12 months before they are allowed to transfer from an unaccredited to an accredited district in the same or adjoining county. Each school district would have the ability to establish a policy for class size and student-teacher ratios. Three regional authorities — responsible for serving the students in St. Louis and St. Louis County, Kansas City and Jackson County, and the rest of our state — would be responsible for coordinating student transfers from unaccredited to accredited districts. Senate Bill 493 would also provide students in struggling and underperforming districts with free tutoring and supplemental education services. With three unaccredited and 11 provisionally accredited districts in our state, the time we spent in the Senate considering all avenues of the student transfer and school accreditation issue was crucial. This week was the annual Missouri Farm Bureau banquet, and Mike Smody from Butler County attended. The event celebrated the importance of agriculture and our hard-working farmers. Teresa McCulloch, Cinda Bryant, and Shelly Crane visited representing the Visiting Nurse Association of Southeast Missouri to discuss issues about in-home care. Mary Ann Allen with Haven House, and Melissa Morgan and Bobby Baugh with Ozark Family Resource Agency, visited for the Missouri Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence awareness day. These organizations do amazing work, and I strongly encourage you to go online to learn more about them. I also had a nice visit from Chrissy McCormick from Kennett, and Mary Howell and Andrea Loafman from Malden. They were here with the Missouri State Teachers Association day at the capitol, and we had a productive and engaging discussion about education. If you would like to read more about the legislation or committees mentioned in this column, visit www.senate.mo.gov/libla. Thank you for the opportunity to serve you. |
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State Senator Doug Libla 201 W. Capitol Ave., Rm. 226 Jefferson City, MO 65101 (573) 751-4843 www.senate.mo.gov/libla
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