MADISON, Wis. — Republicans who control the Wisconsin Assembly passed a package of education bills on Wednesday that would reverse a controversial decision by the Department of Public Instruction to lower state testing standards, ban electronics from classrooms and set limits on pay raises for school administrators.
The Assembly’s votes come just one day after Democratic Gov. Tony Evers called for $3 billion in new school funding over the next two years and State Superintendent Jill Underly, who made the decision to lower testing benchmarks, advanced in her bid for reelection.
“The bad decision made by Superintendent Underly to dumb down our standards really has to be called out and it has to be fixed,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, the state’s top Republican, said ahead of Wednesday’s votes.
Underly has argued that the lower cutoff scores better reflect students’ performance. Republicans on Wednesday accused Underly of changing the standards to make herself look good ahead of her bid for reelection.
Watch: Wisconsin Assembly votes to undo lowered testing standards, ban phones in class
Democrats opposed the bill to restore the old testing standards and defended Underly’s decision.
“These changes are based on the ongoing feedback of the very educators who are in our classrooms every day guiding our children,” said Democratic Rep. Angelina Cruz, who was a public school teacher in Racine for more than two decades. “This bill is not about improving education. This bill is about playing political games.”
In total, the Assembly voted to pass six bills on Wednesday. Each of the bills passed without any Democratic support.
One of the measures would ban electronics in K-12 classrooms in Wisconsin unless they’re being used for educational purposes or in case of emergency. Similar bans have been passed by both Democrats and Republicans in at least eight other states.
Another bill would tie pay raises for school administrators to the average pay raise that teachers in their district received. It would also require that at least 70% of school operating expenditures go towards classroom activities, such as teacher salaries and costs of curriculum.
Other proposals approved by Republicans would require schools to teach civics and cursive, as well as make their curriculum available for members of the public to review.
"While districts around our state are cutting positions, programs, wondering how to make ends meet, the GOP majority is focused on cursive,” said Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer.
The Assembly’s votes are just the first round of approval for each of these bills. They must also be passed by the state Senate and then signed by the governor in order to become laws.
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