RSD News

March 2004 - OLYMPIA—The Senate on Thursday approved a bill to allow high school students as many as four retakes of the 10th-grade Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL), required for graduation.

By 2006, the bill would allow students to retake the WASL twice a year at no cost. It would also require successful WASL scores in reading, writing and math for 10th-grade students to receive a Certificate of Academic Achievement, a graduation requirement by 2008. By 2010, the measure would require graduating seniors to have passing WASL scores in science as well.

The proposal would allow special education students to earn a separate Certificate of Individual Achievement rather than a Certificate of Academic Achievement in order to graduate by 2008.

It would not require homeschool or private school students to earn either certificate.

Members of the House of Representatives must now respond to changes in the bill before the session ends March 11.

The WASL currently tests reading, writing, math and listening in fourth, seventh and 10th grades.

If students fail the 10th-grade exam, they could either retake the test as many as four times or pursue some alternative path for proving how much they have learned. The exact nature of the alternative method or methods isn’t specified in the legislation. The bill instructs state schools’ superintendent Terry Bergeson to devise alternatives, which must then be approved by the Legislature.

The bill also sets up a separate certificate for students with learning disabilities who could never pass the test under any circumstances.

House Bill 2195 would also eliminate the listening test and the planned tests in social studies, art, health and fitness. A science test will be added for the class of 2010.

Group asks voters to approve 1-cent sales tax hike for education

March 2004- Voters in this November’s general election could see an initiative on the ballot asking citizens to approve a 1-cent hike in sales tax, designed to raise $1 billion annually for education in Washington state.

The plan, developed by the League of Education Voters — which sponsored the successful I-728 initiative in 2000 — is intended to raise $1 billion annually to create a separate, dedicated Education Trust Fund for preschools, public K-12 schools, community colleges and universities. The package also includes raises for teachers. Because the Legislature declined to submit the proposal to the voters as a referendum, the league will offer it as an initiative to the voters on the November ballot.

Signature gathering for the education funding initiative is likely to begin in April. The league would need 250,000 signatures in order to meet a legal requirement of 198,000 valid names to get the measure on the ballot. The league will have until July 2 to gather signatures.

A 1-cent hike in sales tax would raise the state rate from 6.5 percent to 7.5 percent. Local sales taxes in King County would rise from 8.8 percent to 9.8 percent. League officials estimate the tax package, if approved, would cost a family earning $50,000 to $60,000 a year an additional $234 annually in taxes.

Education tax plan highlights

PRESCHOOL: The plan would spend $100 million to help enroll 10,000 low-income children, establish quality standards and improve existing programs.

K-12 EDUCATION: About $400 million would go to the state's public schools. Of that, roughly $332 million would go for class-size reduction and related spending and $75 million would go toward programs aimed at helping kids meet tough new state and federal academic standards. The league has earmarked $93 million a year to raise the base pay of teachers and other school employees by 3.6 percent — what they would be earning if the Legislature hadn't suspended Initiative 732 last year. It would not include back pay.

Initiative 732, passed in 2000, mandated annual cost-of-living increases for teachers.

COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES: Higher education would get $400 million per year—$250 million to increase enrollment, $50 million to increase financial aid and $100 million for research.

More information on the proposal can be found by visiting the league’s Web site http://www.educationvoters.org/.