SJR 2006 – Joint Resolution nullifying BOEE’s special education endorsement changes
SJR 2007 – Joint Resolution nullifying BOEE’s increasing fees rule change
SF 2009 – Expand preschool to five year olds
SF 2195 – Dating violence and prevention curriculum
SF 2196 – Enhances literacy requirements for practitioner preparation programs
SF 2200 – Allows online course for a school district
SF 2205 – Hour or days applicable to 90 days of the student’s open athletic ineligibility
SF 2217 – Mandatory child abuse reporter training includes human trafficking
SF 2234 – Credit hours technical change for National Guard educational assistance program
FLOOR ACTION:
SJR 2006 is a Joint Resolution nullifying an administrative rule by the Board of Educational Examiners establishing a special education endorsement and specializations. This rule was delayed until the end of the 2016 session by the Administrative Rules Review Committee in March 2015 after 250 written comments were received by the Legislature on the rule and 52 people attended the public hearing.
The main concerns include:
- Special education teachers, much like general education teachers, have grade-specific degrees so that they can provide quality instruction for students. They further specialize to work with students within certain ranges on the behavioral spectrum. The proposal raises concerns for Iowa’s student teachers.
- This one-sized-fits-all proposal is exactly the type of policy that legislators, educators and concerned community leaders have fought. Specialized areas of instruction — including as elementary, middle school and high school, history, science and mathematics — are what students need for optimal achievement.
- There is no evidence of a correlation between a K-12 generalist license structure and the achievement gap between regular education and special education students. In fact, examples in other states show this very change is ineffective at increasing achievement and addressing special education as a shortage area.
- Iowa’s teacher preparation programs are concerned about the exacerbation of the special education teacher shortage in Iowa if this rule is adopted, as well as the practical questions still left unanswered.
[2/24: 50-0]
SJR 2007 is a Joint Resolution nullifying an administrative rule increasing fees assessed by the Board of Educational Examiners. A joint resolution to nullify the rule does not require the signature of the Governor. SF 2163, a bill approved by the Education Committee last week, would prohibit a fee increase for the next year and limit the amount of carry-forward the BOEE may have each year.
[2/24: 50-0]
SF 2009 expands the statewide preschool program for four-year-old children to also include five-year-old children who have not previously enrolled in a preschool program. Students still can only attend one year of state-funded preschool, but this bill allows parents to choose if they want that year to be when their child is four or five years old. A technical amendment clarifies that the bill applies to school budget years beginning on or after July 1, 2016.
[2/22: 49-0 (Feenstra excused)]
SF 2195 requires that human growth and development instruction by schools include age-appropriate information regarding dating violence and prevention.
[2/23: 50-0]
SF 2205 modifies the current requirement that a student is ineligible to participate in varsity interscholastic athletic contests and athletic competitions the first 90 days of the student’s open enrollment in the receiving district. The bill clarifies that the student is ineligible for the first 90 days, or the equivalent 540 instructional hours, since some schools are now on an hourly calendar, instead of a day’s calendar. A district should determine the ineligibility timeframe based on whatever is shorter, the hours or the days ineligible. The bill takes effect upon enactment and is retroactively to July 1, 2015, for school calendars beginning on or after that date.
[2/23: 50-0]
SF 2196 specifies key reading and literacy requirements for practitioner preparation programs, including but not limited to, training on how to recognize and teach dyslexic students.
[2/23: 50-0]
SF 2217 requires all mandatory child abuse reporters to be trained on how to recognize and get help for minors that are impacted by human trafficking.
[2/23: 50-0]
SF 2200, in limited capacity, allows certain instruction to be provided through the Iowa learning online initiative or by a district for one year.
[2/23: 50-0]
SF 2234 is a technical cleanup bill that addresses credit hours of educational assistance under the National Guard Educational Assistance Program. The 120-hour limit on undergraduate credit hours applies to semester credit hours or the equivalent.
[2/23: 50-0]