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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Conservative Republican legislators are preparing to push for huge changes in Kansas' education system, and more liberal lawmakers said Tuesday that some of their proposals are "hostile" to public K-12 schools.
Ideas under consideration include junking current standardized testing for students, turning over some school services to private companies and forgoing federal dollars to avoid federal education requirements.
A joint legislative committee set up last year to study what students should be learning and the best way to fund schools met briefly Tuesday to review a draft report from its chairman. The report calls for a "complete overhaul" of how the state distributes more than $4 billion in aid annually to its 286 local school districts.
The committee's chairman, Republican Rep. Ron Highland, of Wamego, said he wrote the report to reflect the panel's overall views. The report says public schools aren't adequately preparing enough students for the future or spending taxpayer dollars efficiently enough — arguments commonly made by GOP conservatives who control the Legislature.
"We are trying to promote change to get our public education system and the funding process into the 21st Century," said Sen. Molly Baumgardner, a conservative Louisburg Republican.
But Rep. Melissa Rooker, a moderate Fairway Republican, said the report includes "black helicopter stuff" reflecting distrust of the federal government, opposition to multistate academic standards adopted for Kansas schools and support for giving parents tax-funded "vouchers" they could use at private schools.
The report said federal education requirements are enough of a "burden" that the state ought to weigh the costs against the benefits of taking federal education funds. The state received $510 million for its public schools for 2014-15, about $1,100 per student, or 8.4 percent of the total $13,124 spent per pupil.
"The report was very partisan and didn't include a lot of information," said Rep. Ed Trimmer, of Winfield, one of three Democrats on the committee. "I think it was very anti-public education."
The report said the state's previous, per-student aid formula "hasn't produced the necessary and desired results" for improving students' academic performance. GOP legislators repealed the old formula last year, replacing it with "block grants" for districts under a law set to expire in July 2017.
The committee tabled the draft report and asked the Legislature's nonpartisan research staff to rewrite it to incorporate additional material gleaned from public hearings. The decision put off a potentially contentious debate on the report's recommendations until at least later this month.
The draft report said school funding "needs to be redesigned to focus on the individual student," without going into more detail. Rooker saw that line as support for vouchers.
The report also said the state's current regimen of annual standardized tests for students has "little value" and encourages "teaching to the test." It suggested having the state pay for all high school students to take the ACT college entrance exam and said Kansas should considering other testing.
Also, because school districts operate separately, they duplicate common services, the report said. It suggested that some services, such as transportation, accounting, food services and building maintenance could be handled regionally. It added that turning them over to private companies would provide additional savings.
Much of the report is in line with criticism of public schools and education funding from the Kansas Policy Institute, a conservative think tank influential with GOP legislators. President Dave Trabert said it hasn't reviewed all of the recommendations thoroughly but added, "There was nothing in there that gave us heartburn."
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Online:
The draft report: http://bit.ly/1PbQi49 .
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