LEARNS Act: What we knew and what we expected

The release of Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ LEARNS Act Monday reflected what we mostly knew about Arkansas’ coming education policies and also what we mostly expected about how the politics will play out.

We knew in general what most of Senate Bill 294’s provisions would be. Those include the plan to raise minimum teacher salaries to $50,000 from the current $36,000, with performance bonuses of up to $10,000. All teachers would be guaranteed a $2,000 raise next year over this school year. The state-mandated salary schedule based on tenure and teacher education levels would be gone. While teachers would make more money next year, they also could be fired more easily with the repeal of the Teacher Fair Dismissal Act.

We still don’t know what this is going to cost exactly or how it will be paid for. There’s been an estimate of $300 million for the entire package, of which $150 million would be new expenses, but funding will be included in a later bill.

A more controversial part is the Arkansas Children’s Educational Freedom Account Program, which would provide families up to 90% of the prior year’s statewide per pupil foundation funding for private or homeschooling expenses. This school year, that was $7,413.

The plan would be phased in over three years, until all students are eligible. Next school year, the Department of Education would make payments from each student’s account. After that, parents would direct funds to schools and educational providers. Participating private schools would have to be accredited and would annually test students.

Among the other noteworthy provisions are several pertaining to academics.

On the early grade end, third-graders would have to demonstrate they are meeting reading standards to advance to the fourth grade. Third grade was picked because reading proficiency at that age is a good predictor of future academic success. There are exemptions, but many students could be held back, though only once, considering only 36% currently are meeting the standard. Meanwhile, at the high school level, the bill would create a career pathway diploma that would include academic courses and also career and technical classes.

As expected, the bill would ban the teaching of critical race theory, which is an academic concept asserting that racism is ingrained in the nation’s laws and policies.

It also would prevent teachers from instructing on sex, sexual orientation or gender identity until the sixth grade. That’s two grades later than a much-discussed law in Florida.

Those are some of the policy changes, which we mostly already knew about.

What we expected with the politics was that the bill already would have enough support to virtually guarantee passage.

It does. The bill has 25 sponsors in the 35-member Senate, including the lead sponsor, Sen. Breanne Davis, R-russellville. It has 55 sponsors in the 100-member House, including the lead House sponsor, Rep. Keith Brooks, R-little Rock.

The bill was scheduled to be heard Wednesday by the eight-member Senate Education Committee, of which all six Republicans are sponsors, including Davis. Writing this on Tuesday, I’m sure opponents will make their points, and it’s conceivable that someone will reveal a technical issue or other problem so glaring that Davis must amend the bill.

But it would have to be huge. If there is a problem, lawmakers could pass the bill anyway and then pass another one to correct it.

Assuming it passes Wednesday, the bill could be heard by the full Senate Thursday and then go next week to the House Education Committee, where 12 of the 20 members are sponsors. Then it would go to the full House and potentially be on

Sanders’ desk by the end of next week.

Arkansas could overhaul its education system a weekand-a-half after most people have had a chance to see the 144-page bill for the first time. As stated earlier, most of its provisions have been described previously in general, but details do matter. At this point, most of the work has been done by a relatively small number of people following Sanders’ lead.

The LEARNS Act very well may improve Arkansas’ education system. What we’ve been doing isn’t working well enough.

On the other hand, this train surely is leaving the station in a hurry, which is not unexpected.