Anti-Common Core bill goes to governor

The so-called anti-Common Core bill passed both chambers Tuesday, absent a controversial amendment that would have required the state Board of Education to adopt 75 percent of recommendations from a new commission.

Senate Bill 2161 passed the Senate 87-29 and passed the House with only six no votes. It now heads to Gov. Phil Bryant for a signature.

"This legislation will end Common Core and allow Mississippians to create strong academic standards that are among the highest in the nation," Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves said in a statement immediately after the vote.

Not everyone agreed.

"This bill means nothing," said state Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ellisville. "It's smoke and mirrors."

The measure severs ties with the national Common Core-aligned testing consortia, called PARCC, and creates the Mississippi Commission on College and Career Readiness whose members will study the state's current K-12 education standards and determine whether they should remain in place or be changed – either in part or entirely.

But an attempt to require the state Board of Education to adopt a majority of those recommendations was removed from the final version of the bill.

"We did take that 75 percent language out, but they shall be reporting back to the governor, the House and the Senate by Dec. 1," said House Education Committee Chairman John Moore, R-Brandon. "If there are significant changes, and (the Board of Education members) don't act, we'll be in here the first of January, and we'll have to change their minds."

The removal of that language angered members of the Senate Conservative Coalition, including McDaniel, who said the bill is now essentially useless.

State Sen. Angela Hill, R-Picayune, echoed that sentiment but voted for the measure anyway, call it the only chance Mississippi has now to kill Common Core.

The governor, lieutenant governor, speaker of the House and Department of Education will appoint most of the commission's 11 voting members. Four others will serve as non-voting members.

Their work is expected to begin by June 1.

Mississippi adopted Common Core State Standards five years ago, along with most other states. The standards guide curriculum at every elementary and secondary public school in the state.

Students will be tested on those standards this year using assessments developed by the Common Core-aligned Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC.

But they won't be tested on PARCC assessments next year, said Senate Education Committee Chairman Gray Tollison, R-Oxford.

Tollison noted new language in the bill that prevents state Board of Education from requiring school districts to administer assessments developed by PARCC or any other consortia.

That doesn't necessarily mean districts can't administer PARCC; just that the state can't force them to, said State Sen. Michael Watson, R-Pascagoula.

Not so, Tollison said: "After this school year, no more and forever. No more PARCC testing."

Mississippi Department of Education officials already announced they would not use PARCC next year and solicited proposals from other companies to administer student assessment. The agency thus far refuses to say how many companies have submitted proposals or who they are.

The bill adopted Tuesday also includes language inserted from House Bill 665, which had died earlier this year, removing the requirement that high school seniors pass all four subject-area tests in order to graduate. The state Board of Education had adopted a similar policy in mid-March.

"We are putting that language in there so state department couldn't renege on that," Moore said.

The measure also protects private student information from being shared.

State Sen. David Jordan, D-Greenwood, voted for the bill but said he worries about dismantling Common Core after all the work the state did to fully implement the education standards. He said he doesn't want to see Mississippi school children remain at the bottom.

"When we adopted Common Core, we thought it was the best thing for us," he said. "Now we're going in another direction."

Contact Emily Le Coz at (601) 961-7249 or elecoz@jackson.gannett.com. Follow @emily_lecoz on Twitter.