Interim Committee Week #5: School Safety, CBE, CTE and a followup on Schools of Hope.

Looking forward to the official start of session on March 5th, committees are now in full swing, meeting weekly, hearing bills and moving them forward.

This week is Interim Committee Week #5 (Feb 11-15). This week is, also, the one year anniversary of the Parkland tragedy and, appropriately, School Safety discussions will be front and center. Committees will also be discussing Competency Based Education, Career and Technical Education, and update’s on 2017’s controversial HB7069 Schools of Hope law.

Here’s what the legislature has scheduled for us:

Tuesday, February 12

10:30 am: House Education

Discussion will focus around 2017’s controversial Schools of Hope program, passed in HB7069:

• Presentation and update on Somerset Academy in Jefferson County. Jefferson County has been the poster child of charter school takeover by the state. It was the state endorsed takeover of Jefferson Schools that qualified Academica, one of Florida’s largest and most politically connected charter chains, to qualify as a “Schools of Hope Operater.” 
• Discussion on implementation of community partnership schools model at Evans High School, a successful community school (public school) in Orange County. 
• Presentation by the Department of Education on implementation of Schools of Hope Traditional Public Schools Grant Program. (more info here)

4:00 pm: Senate Education

• Entire meeting devoted to SPB 7030 by Education—School Safety and Security. You can read the bill’s analysis here.

Wednesday, February 13

1:30 pm: House PreK-12 Innovation

• HB 401 — Mastery-based Education : This updates and renames the Competency Based Education Pilot program, a favorite of Jeb Bush’s Foundation.
• Presentation on Career and Technical Education by Dr. James R. Stone III, Director of the National Research Center for Career and Technical Education (NRCCTE) at Southern Regional Education Board (SREB)

4:00 pm House PreK-12 Appropriations Subcommittee

• Consideration of a variety of funding request bills.
• Presentation on Status of Safe Schools Appropriations from last session’s SB 7026
• Presentation on Safe Schools Appropriations in Governor’s FY 2019-20 Budget
• Presentation on Results of Review of the Florida Safe Schools Assessment Tool

The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Education and the House PreK-12 Quality Subcommittee do not have meetings scheduled this week.

Once again, if you value public schools, this year will be an especially good year to speak out in their support. As always, if you can’t be there in person, you can watch these meetings live streamed on The Florida Channel.

Stay informed and call out the accountabaloney when you smell it.