WVEA

The House Education Committee voted down HB2009 Monday, just one day after the state Senate passed all seven items on the education reform Special Session agenda.

This weekend, the Senate signed off on the seven bills a joint legislative committee on education reform had been working on for more than a month.

Things are not going as smoothly in the House Education Committee, the first stop for the proposed bills in the state House of Delegates.  On Monday, members had a lot of questions about the bill that would have created pilot programs to increase academic achievement.

West Virginia Education Association President Dale Lee says it all came down to one thing -- too many unanswered questions.  "The House committee members had major questions about the graduation rates, the ability to come in and intervene in a much quicker time," he said.

In fact, Lee says he wasn't confident at all about the bill heading into the Special Session.

"I had major concerns that all of them would pass. I didn't think they would.  The work group worked as much as we could on compromises and things, but there were still concerns."

HB2009 dealt with programs that would have helped low performing schools make the grade, programs dealing with the rising drop out rate, low performance on tests and poor graduation levels.

Lee says some of the bills need more work before they'll get the approval of the House.  He says lawmakers were able to get a good start with the working group, but now it's time for the entire Legislature to give their input.