Blog

We don’t want guns in our schools!

SMAC PTA Shawnee Mission Area Council Legislative Session 2013 ACTION:  Contact members of the Federal and State Affairs conference committee: Senators:   Ralph Ostmeyer Ralph.Ostmeyer@senate.ks.gov Jay Emler Jay.Emler@senate.ks.gov Oletha Faust-Goudeau Oletha.Faust-Goudeau@senate.ks.govHouse Representatives: Arlen Siegfreid Arlen.Siegfreid@house.ks.gov Steve Brunk Steve.Brunk@house.ks.gov Louis Ruiz Louis.Ruiz@house.ks.gov Action Alert – Concealed Carry Two bills regarding concealed carry in schools will be heard in the Federal and State Affairs conference committee on Monday, April 1st 1:00 PM, room 144-South The task of the committee is to meld the bills for final action.  HB 2055 exempts school districts from allowing public concealed carry. S Sub for HB2052...
Read more Leave a Comment

Still watching third/first grade retention

 We’re still watching third/first grade retention. Brownback is not happy with some of the changes we like. We believe if legislative leaders are going to insist on importing education bills from Florida, the least we can do is look at them carefully and change them in a way that makes sense for Kansas. We don’t want to follow unproven “reform” models just because KPI, ALEC, or Jeb Bush’s FEE say we should. As Sen. Kelly said, “We need to let facts get in our way here.” http://cjonline.com/news/state/2013-03-27/brownback-not-thrilled-rewrite-reading-reform...
Read more Leave a Comment

Amended third/first grade retention passes Senate

 The reading retention bill passed the Senate today 30-10. We disagree with the bill in principle and believe that these decisions should be left to parents, teachers, principals and the Kansas Board of Education. That being said, the Senate removed many of the worst aspects of the bill as described in our post yesterday, and given that it was part of Brownback’s State of the State, passage of something was pretty well assured. From here the bill will go to conference committee where we will try to watch what happens to it. We also have to wonder how...
Read more Leave a Comment