Delaware State Board Of Education May Survive After All…

Last month, I reported the Delaware State Board of Education was done.  The Delaware Joint Finance Committee took their funding away from them.  Many assumed they were toast.  We were wrong.  It appears the Delaware Department of Education will pick up the tab.  So there will be more State Board of Education meetings in the future.  And there is big news on that front as well.  Starting in July, their meetings will begin at 5pm.  Which means, you know, teachers and educators and working parents can actually go to these meetings.  As well, they will have public comment before each action item (except those which have a formal public comment period, such as charter school stuff and regulations).  Unless the Joint Finance Committee or the legislators deny the funding to DOE to do this.

So what happened?  The changes to Delaware Title 14 would be monstrous.  They would have to change up a lot of things.  While some thought things could change in the epilogue language of the state budget (which I oppose in and of itself), it is not an option.  New laws would have to come out granting the authority to the Delaware DOE.  While those could happen, it would be a headache and a half to get them in play between now and June 30th.

There was talk during the Joint Sunset Review meetings about the State Board taking on one or two new members.  With that being said, and probably because of all the confusion surrounding if they should even exist, Delaware Governor John Carney never nominated anyone to take Jorge Melendez’ place on the board.  So there could be changes to the membership.  I am hoping for some folks with more resistance to the Rodel way of thinking.  I haven’t heard anything about Donna Johnson going anywhere.  The Executive Director role is chosen by the State Board of Education President which is currently Dr. Teri Quinn Gray.  She was appointed by former Governor Jack Markell.

The State Board of Education is still under Sunset Review by that legislative committee.  Prior to the announcement about their funding, the committee agreed to hold them over until next year.

The CHAIR of the House Education Committee LIES About Opt Out Bill Controversy #grammarmatters

Today, State Rep. Earl Jaques (who is also the Chair of the House Education Committee) finally responded to my Facebook post about the status of the opt out bill, House Bill 60.  He is claiming…well, sort of…that no bills were walked because of the non-existence of a quorum in the House Education Committee meeting last week.  Which is funny, because the other four bills show they are out of committee.  As for House Bill 60, it is still showing as “House Education Committee”.  It doesn’t say if it was released or not released.  Can someone please tell the right hand what the left hand is doing?

It is hard to know what he is saying because his grammar usage was…how shall I put this…without offending him…very poor.  For a Chair of the House Education Committee I would expect more, but I digress.  This led to some very hysterical responses by the way.  Which can be seen below…

Gotta love that Earl Jaques!  To be honest, aside from opt out bills, Earl and I get along very well.  I would love to know what it is about opt out that makes him so crotchety!  So if ALL bills were signed during the committee meeting, doesn’t that mean House Bill 60 should be on the House Ready List, meaning it gets a full House vote?  Why is it showing this:

Whereas, as an example, House Bill 193 shows it was released:

And by the way, Speaker of the House Pete Schwartzkopf never responded to my email.