HB15-1105: Revising Accountability Measures in Public Education

• Repeals existing academic standards for English language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies adopted in 2009-2010; establishes new standards based on pre-2009 standards from high-performing states (California, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota) with updates by July 1, 2015.

• Creates an Academic Standards Steering Committee with legislators, university leaders, business representatives, teachers, and school board members to oversee development of new standards through specialized committees in ELA, mathematics, science, and social studies.

• Requires the state board to direct the Department of Education to develop new statewide assessments in English language arts, mathematics, and science aligned with the new standards, with restrictions on collecting non-cognitive and behavioral data.

• Reduces the required weight of student academic growth in teacher evaluations from 50% to 15%, though allows districts to set percentages up to 50%, and transfers duties of the Council for Educator Effectiveness to the steering committee.

• Establishes statewide testing requirements limited to federal minimums (annual testing grades 3-8 in ELA/math, specific grades in science) and grants parents the right to excuse children from testing and choose paper-based assessments without penalizing students or schools.