As members heard a legislative update during this month’s meeting of the State Board of Education, new chairman Bill Cobey took a moment to express his concerns about SB 337, which would create a new charter school oversight board.

SBE Chairman Bill Cobey

Acknowledging that the full SBE may not want to take a formal position on the bill at this time, Cobey said that he personally could not support SB 337 and found that the legislation was unconstitutional.

SB 337 would abolish the Charter School Advisory Council, which is housed under the State Board of Education, and replace it with a new independent board comprised of members handpicked by the Governor and his colleagues. The new board would be an independent body tasked with setting policy for charter schools. Read More…

You might recall that about a month ago, citizens were threatened with arrest as they silently protested SB 337, a bill to create a new charter school board that would remove oversight of public charter schools from the State Board of Education and put it in the hands of a new, independent entity comprising members handpicked by the Governor.

In spite of significant opposition to the bill by members of the public and more debate this morning by lawmakers, SB 337 marched on in a Senate appropriations committee meeting this morning where it was passed without any audible nays.

One of several contentious issues with the bill included the provision that teachers at charter schools would not be required to have gone through a teacher preparation program leading to licensure. The proposed committee substitute before Senate members today made one small change to require that teachers who teach core subject areas in grades six through twelve must be college graduates. However, those teachers would not need to be licensed. Read More…