Kentucky.

Tonight I'm Renee Shaw, and we thank you so much for joining us this evening.

Our topic tonight, public education legislation.

State lawmakers are considering several education related measures that examine school governance, financial transparency, administrator compensation increases, teacher recruitment, leadership development, accountability and assessment, and more.

Most are high ranking policy priorities of the Republican supermajority.

Meanwhile, early childhood education is top of mind for the minority party.

In separate news conferences today, House and Senate Democrats announced another push to expand access to pre-K.

We'll break it all down with our four guests and our Lexington studio tonight.

State Senator Stephen West, a Republican from Paris and chair of the Senate Education Committee.

State Senator Reginald Thomas, a Democrat from Lexington, Senate Minority Caucus chair and member of the Senate Education Committee.

State Representative Scott Lewis, a Republican from Hartford and chair of the House Primary and Secondary Education Committee.

And state Representative.

Tina Bojanowski, a Democrat from Louisville and ranking minority member of the House Primary and Secondary Education Committee.

We certainly want to hear from you tonight.

You can send us your questions and comments by X. Formerly known as Twitter at Pub Affairs KET.

Send an email to KY Tonight at Keturah or use the web form at Keturah KY tonight.

Or you can simply give us a call at one 800 494 7605.

Welcome, guests.

We appreciate you all being here.

A late start for you all today.

And an early morning in the morning.

Those 8:00 meetings I know talk to you all about that right.

Let's start with some Senate measures and a priority measure, Senate Bill one.

And we know that any time the lower the number the higher priority.

Is that right, Mr.

Chairman?

That's absolutely right.

Senate Bill one transfers some of the power of the elected school board to the superintendent and Jefferson County Public Schools.

And there was some interesting testimony a couple of weeks ago from the current superintendent, Doctor Brian Yearwood, who said, you want to give me this authority, this expanded authority, but I shouldn't have it.

So why should he have it?

>> The reason he should have it is JCPS is a totally unique entity in the state of Kentucky.

It states right in I think it's section six of the bill.

It just describes how large JCPS is.

JCPS has 95,000 students.

Their budget is about $1.9 billion.

And so as as JCPS goes, so, so goes our state as far as especially scores and those sorts of things.

And also we're really honed in on achievement and making sure it's not just about the statistics and about the scores.

It's about are the kids getting the quality of education that they deserve?

>> Superintendent Yearwood had testified a couple of weeks ago that he didn't see this as being a bill about student achievement and student success outcomes.

What do you say to his criticism there?

>> Well, you know, there's a lot of politics and Frankfort, but there's a lot of politics in Jefferson County school system as well.

And, you know, when you have your employer sitting next to you in the committee meeting, the vice chair of the board, you know, maybe your answers are a little different than maybe you think behind closed doors.

So he has a line to to walk, a tightrope to walk in his position.

I will say I've been very pleased with Doctor Yearwood.

He's saying all the right things.

He's made some very difficult decisions early on, trying to right the ship and get their budget in order.

So so we're very pleased with what he's done so far.

And, you know, it's hard to believe that that we're trying to tell him, hey, we're trying to give you more power to do all the good things you say you want to.

>> Do, right?

>> But he does have a political tightrope to walk.

>> Well, Senator Thomas, I want to come to you because your colleague, the minority Leader, Gerald Neal, said during that committee that we should just give Doctor Yearwood more time to settle in right before giving him perhaps more power.

How do you see Senate Bill one?

And do you think that it should take away power from an elected school board and give it to an appointed or selected superintendent?

>> Well, Renee, my biggest concern about Senate Bill one is that, you know, there are no justifications for doing what they did.

They have all these findings, Renee.

But but where do they come from?

You know, other than maybe, you know, looking at some reports or, you know, reading the newspapers, there was there's there's really been no thorough, detailed investigation as to what's causing these problems with JCPS.

Now, as you recall from that meeting, I asked doctor, I asked him a question.

Doctor, would you would you believe these problems are being caused by the structural governance of JCPS?

Because that's what one of the findings said.

He said there's nothing about the structural governance that's creating these problems.

These problems do exist.

He didn't deny that.

He said they're very real, but it's not because of the way the structural governance is created.

What they're proposing to do is two things, Renee, that I think really harm the city of Louisville.

One, they're cutting back on how the board can meet.

The board can only meet once a month, which means if there's a need for an emergency meeting, a school shooting, Renee, or or a sudden decline in the budget, they can't meet, you know, that really handicaps the board significantly in terms of operating.

Secondly, Renee, they're giving Doctor Yearwood, and I want your viewers to understand this.

They're giving him a $250,000 blank check to write for expenses any time they want.

>> And what do you mean by that?

Giving him a $50,000 blank check.

>> I mean, he can he can write a check.

If you read the legislation, he can write a check.

Renee, for $250,000, a quarter of $1 million without consulting the board at all.

I mean, we've been talking about financial accountability.

I mean, that that's that's really shaky grounds when you talk about being accountable to to for a person, be accountable when they can just sign their name for $250,000 and.

>> Say, do they have to comply with the transparent financial transparency rules that are embodied in Senate Bill three?

That's a separate measure.

What he also have to post all of those itemized expenses up to a quarter million dollars.

>> Of course he would.

But that's after the fact, Renee.

That's after the fact, you know, now, generally before a superintendent can can write a check, he's got to get board approval.

I want to come to you.

This is going to cost $200,000.

I want your approval to do that.

That's what that's the way it is in Fayette County and the board.

>> Is there any monetary threshold?

What is the monetary threshold right now.

>> In Fayette County?

>> In Fayette County?

>> I don't I don't know that there's any I don't know, I mean, I think even $400, I mean, maybe that can go on a credit card somewhere.

But, but, but but again, that would require some kind of, you know, board okay on that.

But but that's a significant difference here.

You know, Renee, I don't want to take up too much time.

But there was never a question asked the Doctor Yearwood in that presentation about doctor, what's your strategic plan now?

What are you going to do?

Give us your roadmap for success.

You're going to give the superintendent all this authority and not question, you know, how he's going to implement it.

Now, that's very telling.

>> I want to go to Chairman West again before I get to Representative Tina Bojanowski, because she is in the Jefferson County school system, so she knows the issues surrounding the district very well.

But respond to Senator Thomas.

>> Yeah, this the general idea and I said this on the floor is we don't have to guess about what's happened to JCPS.

I've been in this position ten years.

Center Givens, who's the sponsor of this bill, has been in the Senate a lot longer than that.

And we've heard the same thing year after year after year.

Give us more time and give us more money.

And to this point, the results aren't where they need to be on performance.

And so I stated this on the floor.

Whatever you say about this, this bill, SB1, it at least does something different.

It changes the way that they do business.

And and very simply it it clarifies who sets the strategy, which is the board.

The elected board is still in place.

It clarifies who runs the day to day operations, which is the superintendent, and it creates accountability.

Senate Bill three also creates accountability clearly and would apply to Jefferson County if passed.

And so it's it's a new it's a new pathway that that puts down some barriers.

It does give the superintendent more power.

But as you see with large entities, let's take apply it to business, a large corporation, a lot of times a large entity, you know that that power in the hands of a CEO or professional can really help move things, move things in the right direction.

And the whole idea is, is this the perfect bill and is it going to do everything right?

No.

But is it a change from from previous past?

Yes.

>> Some people would question the wisdom in giving the superintendent a quarter million dollar petty cash fund, though.

Explain the rationale for that.

>> Well, there's always accountability.

SB three would would they would have to show what you're spending it on and let's, you know.

>> The board.

>> The board is still in control of that superintendent.

So they're the ones that have the four year contracts.

They approve the four year, three, four year contracts of the of the superintendent.

And so if a superintendent is writing to many of these $250,000 checks, he's a he or she is accountable to the board and they can non renew the contract.

And so there's one thing to have a $250,000 check for a county and rural Kentucky, but Jefferson County school system this this is going to give the superintendent more flexibility with spending.

And maybe they need maybe they need that.

Maybe that's something new that they haven't had that they can use.

>> Well, the $188 million deficit, though many people would question Representative Bozinovski the wisdom and giving the superintendent broader authority to write such a substantial amount of expenses without having advanced approval.

First, is that one of the flaws you see with this bill, and what are the others?

>> I think that the first thing that jumps out at me in this bill is thinking about our district.

So Jefferson County Public Schools has the most public school choice in our state.

We've got magnet schools, academies.

We've got zones where children can pick where they go to school.

With that, we have three of the top ten high schools in the state.

So we're doing a lot of really good things in Kentucky in Jefferson County.

But if you take these kids, I had a principal tell me once and she was just a not a magnet principal.

She said by the time kids get to her, they've been sifted out seven times.

So like they've had opportunities to be the more advanced students have had opportunities to go to different schools.

So then you end up with select schools that have more concentrated poverty and more likelihood of becoming CSI schools.

So which.

>> Are comprehensive.

>> Comprehensive support.

>> Improvement, improvement.

>> Right.

So Jefferson County as a whole is in the orange category.

But as you know, we have the most CSI schools that's brought up.

We don't discuss how we have the best high school in the state.

That's not brought up very often.

But do we you know, so one of my thoughts is if if what we're trying to mitigate is how many CSI schools do we have?

We have do we then stop having our school choice programing and send everyone back to their neighborhood schools?

Because it's just it's a numbers game, right?

If you have the more advanced kids going back to neighborhood schools, those scores will go up.

Is that, you know, the solution?

No, that doesn't make any sense at all.

So we have to look at why the kids who are in these lower performing schools are lower performing.

Is it because we have 139 different languages in the district, higher concentrated poverty, lots of kids with trauma and and behavioral issues that are interrupting their learning.

That's where we need to focus is how to support those children.

>> Can I comment on that real quick?

Renee.

Representative Bogdanovski brings up an excellent point.

And ultimately, at the end of the day, that's why we're here with SB one.

Jefferson County has 41 of the 55 CSI schools in Kentucky.

So for the people out there watching a CSI school is comprehensive support and improvement.

That's the lower 5% of schools in in the Commonwealth, and they're performing at lowest level.

And in Jefferson County has 41 out of those 55 across the state.

And so those are the kids that we want to try to help.

And it's been that way for about two decades.

And so this this bill is aimed to change things to, to maybe this mixes up the system, maybe it and maybe there's some unintended consequences, things of that nature, as Senator Schickel was always good about saying, we'll be back here in nine months.

We'll be back in session in nine months.

So any unintended consequences we can try to fix.

>> But this measure alone isn't.

The structural governance piece is not meant to totally rectify the issues of Jefferson County public schools, right?

There are other issues that we'll talk about that we'll do that.

>> There's not any.

You know how education is.

There's no silver bullet to these questions, but maybe it's a component.

>> Chairman Lewis, this this ball is in your court right now.

When can we expect a hearing on SB one and House Primary and Secondary Education Committee.

>> Right now obviously we're focused on House bills.

So we we've not really went through all of the Senate bills, just from what I know on this bill and hearing, hearing discussion on it, we have passed in the last five years, probably superintendent now is in overall control of the curriculum.

And number two is we put the superintendent on the site based councils when they hire principals.

So we've we've made some corrections along the way to give superintendents a little more power and a little more authority.

You know, some some of the issues about it's $250,000.

Every district right now probably has a set figure.

I think mine was $7,500 when I was a superintendent.

I didn't have to get approval of the board to.

It's a large district, $250,000, still a lot of money.

So that might be something that needs to be looked at.

But again, you know, I think all of us want the same goal.

And that is to improve Jefferson County and all all schools in the state of Kentucky.

It's just how are we going to get there?

So, you know, at some point the bill will have a hearing and maybe there will be some ideas that we can all agree on and and help shape that bill.

For for the best of everyone.

>> I'm going to go out of numerical order because kind of related to this topic is Senate Bill 114, which would change the way school boards in Jefferson and Fayette County, Fayette County being the second largest school district in the state.

The how those are appointed rather the school boards rather than elected.

So and we've heard a lot of interesting commentary and testimony about lack of democratization of this very local decision making body.

Explain the rationale for this.

>> Senate bill.

114 kind of goes along with Senate Bill one, the same kind of general idea.

Let's let's do something different.

Let's let's change things up.

What in essence, what it does.

The gist of the bill is, is there are seven geographic divisions within within the county.

Let's let's take JCPS as an example.

And each each one of those districts gets a board member.

And then there's four members at large okay.

So we are adding member.

We would be adding if Senate Bill 114 were to get a hearing and were to pass, then we would be adding members to the school board.

And so that the key component that I'm sure these guys will want to talk about is the mayor.

You know, the mayor would have would have appointment powers.

Those of those school board members to be confirmed by the city council.

So that's how.

>> Does it make it more Partizan or less Partizan.

>> More Partizan.

>> To be specific to represent Bujnowski.

I'm going to try to take the words out of her mouth.

So so there's political proportionality in the bill.

And so you have to have the Republican Democrat representation similar to what we do with college boards, the Kentucky, the school board.

And there is precedent that we do this in other places.

>> So if there's precedent, what's wrong with this representative?

>> Well, number one, it's special legislation.

Was it only I mean, our Constitution, section 53 of our Constitution says we're not to have special legislation.

So we're not doing this.

This is not every school board.

This is only JCPS and Fayette County Public Schools.

Secondly, it takes away the ability for constituents within the district to elect their school board members.

And then thirdly, it adds a partizan nature.

So we're kind of flipping around on what is and isn't Partizan.

So within the last year or two, we changed the mayoral and Metro Council elections to be nonpartisan.

So now a nonpartisan mayor has to select school board members who won't get to be voted on in a partizan nature.

They have to pick Democrats and Republicans.

And then the nonpartisan Metro Council would confirm those Partizan individuals.

I think, number one, I think our school board should be elected.

And number two, I think that school board members should be pro-public education.

I don't think you need a D or an R next to your name to signify that you support public education.

>> How do you see it?

Senator Thomas.

>> Central West said this is being done elsewhere, and I want to know elsewhere.

You heard me talk on the Senate floor, and I used cities such as Atlanta, Tampa, Nashville, southern cities, not cities, not necessarily in size and scope to Lexington.

But again, you know, cities that urban urban cities, okay, none of them.

Not one of them, Renee, you know, have an appointed school board member.

In fact, they have nine school board members, all of them that are elected by the general public.

Okay.

And so that's what they're doing and doing very well.

I think Representative Bogdanovsky summed up the way I feel about this.

We're going from a school board historically that that is nonpartisan nature across the state.

And now we're injecting politics in our school board.

And that's a that's a dangerous route to go down.

Renee, when you talk about education, to insert politics in, in terms of what you should teach, who should teach, how should be taught, you know, we don't we don't want that in our schools.

Now, again, Atlanta, Tampa, Charlotte they don't do that.

And so I just think 114 is really taking us down a path that's that's really going to impact public education in a very negative way.

>> Chairman West, I want to go to a point that I think Representative Bozinovski was getting at was about constitutionality of Senate Bill 114, because Senate Bill one, when it came about in 2022, was struck down by the Supreme Court.

We know there was a reversal last year and because of it was considered unreasonably unreasonable, but also because it was special legislation.

How is this bill not special legislation like the previous version was of Senate Bill one.

>> So let's start.

Let's start with Senate Bill one.

Senate Bill one was not struck down because it was special legislation.

The court struck it down.

But what's unusual about the case is the court gave a clear road for policy.

It says we don't know what the policy is.

If you'll do these things, we can get to the point where it is we consider it constitutional.

And they were very clear about how they laid it, laid that that out.

It is important to note the way Senate Bill one was handled by the court.

So the Supreme Court found that it was constitutional.

And then we had a judge's race for Supreme Court Justice Goodwin was put on the court and with a very unique procedural motion and manner, they pulled the case back for review and passed it.

Having said that, they still did put in there.

You know, here's a here's a roadmap for success, basically.

And that's what Senate Bill one has done.

They said, give us some policy reasons for doing this and we'll consider it.

Senator Givens, I believe, laid out 43 policy sections.

>> Pages.

>> Yes, eight pages.

Very voluminous, going to 114.

Talk about 114.

This in my opinion, this is not special legislation.

And the reason for that is the General Assembly itself sets out the rules and regulations as to how Jefferson County was formed and how it currently operates as a city.

Okay, so it's a unique operational system in Jefferson County.

We the legislature passed a law that allows that Jefferson County is the only city in the state of Kentucky that operates the way it does.

Kind of the same thing with Fayette County, UK that is a unique governance structure under under under our law.

And so if Senate Bill 114 is considered special, special legislation, then necessarily the way Jefferson County was formed and the way Fayette County was formed has to be special legislation, because it's you.

We set them up in unique ways.

And so that way, you know, the Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.

Urinea, you know.

And so if the if the legislature is able to set up a city a certain way, unique way, then it can also pass laws that affect it in a unique way.

>> Any more further comment on that?

>> Well, I just don't think that that defends taking the right of the constituency to elect their school board.

>> But if I may comment on that for a minute.

Renee, what the state has not done is set up school boards in a separate way based upon their population.

I mean, the Jefferson County School Board, the Fayette County School Board, have operated consistent with all other school boards in this state, all hundred and 71 of them for well over a century.

The school board's governance has not changed.

Now, all of a sudden, we want in Senate Bill one and Senate Bill 114 to change the governance of these two special schools.

I think that absolutely, there is an argument that could be made under section 59 and 60 of the Kentucky Constitution that this special legislation.

>> School board could make a quick comment on something Senator Thomas said earlier.

I disagree.

We can agree or disagree, but the idea of we're starting to inject politics into school boards.

Have you ever been to a school board meeting?

I think there's been politics in school board meetings for a long time and will continue to be.

It's it's one of the most political dynamics you can get into if you're a politician.

So politics is involved in all this stuff.

And it just this would just change the dynamic, dynamic dynamic of those politics.

>> But Renee, no school board member right now has a D or an R behind their name like we do in the state Senate.

We have a DNR behind our name.

We don't have a school board in this state as of today that has that.

>> I'm I'm waiting for the General Assembly to go nonpartisan.

>> Oh goodness.

Who's going to file that bill?

But is there not Senator Thomas, to your point, is there not already some presumption on where a particular candidate for school board would lean based on their platform that they present to voters to consider?

>> Well, Renee, I think you can make that argument about anyone who comes, you know, comes before a body and talks a certain way about what positions they take.

I mean, we live in a highly charged political environment.

I agree with you on that point.

But still, nonetheless, we don't vote for school board members.

I haven't haven't since the adoption of the Constitution in 1891, based upon their their Partizan affiliation.

And I think that's a good thing in education.

I think we've done that because we try as hard as we can to keep politics out of curriculum and who's teaching students and how they're being taught.

We try to do that.

Renee.

>> Is this a constitutional amendment and should it be and will it have to be eventually?

Senate Bill 114.

>> No, this is not a constitutional amendment.

This this will be just straight legislation that would have to pass both chambers and be signed by the governor or the veto over it.

>> Okay, Chairman Lewis, and I'm going to start with you next time on the next question to get you in the game here.

I'm so sorry, sir, but your thoughts on Senate Bill 114 and particularly how it's connected to Senate Bill one?

>> Well, Senate Bill 114, from what I know of and again, we really haven't, you know, dug deep into those bills yet because like I said, we're still working on House bills, but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to adding more board members to our bigger districts.

I'm not a fan of the mayor's, you know, appointing the board members.

I just I know in other areas I've seen that done some of our bigger cities, and I'm just not sure if I'm supportive of that.

And there may be more to it for me to look into.

But I do think that there's maybe some merit for our bigger districts.

Maybe if they wanted to add a few more members.

>> Yeah.

Okay, now it's your turn, chairman.

Okay.

House Bill 257 and this is one of the accountability measures that would create a new state accountability system permitting local districts to develop their own systems.

So talk us through this.

>> Well, house Bill 257 was filed by representative JT pain.

And we feel like it's a good bill.

It does several different things.

Number one, it moves us to a growth model instead of a change model.

And that's important for a few reasons.

But number one is it measures the growth of the kid from year to year and individual kids.

Right.

And not a group one year to the next.

So, you know, we think that's a positive change.

But what that also does if you're a change model, you can't get an ESL waiver that extends one more year, which means.

>> A second language.

>> Yes, English is second language.

And as you know, our ESL population has doubled in the last ten years and a lot of our districts have 120 different languages.

Jefferson County, including those.

So, you know, it's hard for us to be held accountable and hard for the student to be held accountable when they can't even speak our English.

But yet they're accountable on our testing system.

So it helps that the local piece would encourage districts to have more engagement in the community and let the communities decide what those pieces look like, whether they're a heavy industrial maintenance district, or they want to be more focused on the arts.

So it would give skin in the game for our local communities and give feedback to our school districts.

So we think it's a good starting point on maybe doing some things different in our accountability system.

And I really I do like this bill.

I think it's a good bill.

>> So for those who would say, well, what does this mean for kids who are not just going to be competing with other kids in their district, but across the county and state lines and globally, what does it do to prepare them for that?

>> You still measure that.

And, you know, the big test that we've got.

This brings me into something that I want to mention.

You know, every state has a different test, so it's hard to know how you really compare.

But we take a Nape test every year.

That is that is all the states.

So you know, and a lot of people don't even realize this.

Our latest scores for Kentucky, we were 10th and fourth grade reading.

We were 20th in fourth grade math.

We were 21st in eighth grade reading, and we were 27th in eighth grade math.

So we're making gains from bills that we passed in previous sessions with Senator West and Representative Tipton's reading bill, numeracy bill that was passed.

We passed some bills the last couple sessions.

We passed first grade kindergarten type deal where we see kids that are behind.

We give them immediate feedback and help right then and then.

Hopefully by third grade we have them reading on grade level.

So I think we made some progress.

And and I would like to see us do more with the early grades, because that's where you can make the most progress.

If you can teach a kid to read by third grade, our upper scores are going to be fine.

And we're already doing some really great things in our upper level.

But but that goes back to some of the things we're talking about for Jefferson County.

Maybe we take the CSI schools and they're not all Jefferson County.

A majority are, but maybe we have some different ways to deal with those.

Jefferson County's got some great schools, but like I said, they've also got a pod of schools that we deal with every year that we're having a hard time putting, putting our hand on.

Maybe we gave Superintendent Yearwood more freedom there where he can pick the principals of those buildings and be able to sort of pick his leadership team and maybe some incentive pay for teachers that that would, you know, go to that area if they're the best teachers in the district.

So I think if we focused a lot of resources there, and maybe we wouldn't need as much as this overall governance or change in governance.

So, you know, that's just a couple of things.

A couple thoughts I have.

>> I think I think this is a fabulous bill and it's a great first step.

It's a really big change.

So in addition to changing from change to growth, the assessment.

So we have to follow the federal requirements of what we test as a state.

And writing is not on the federal requirement.

So in this bill we propose to no longer require from the state level the on demand writing and the editing mechanics test.

And if you think about it, what students do is they sit down and they have 90 minutes to draft and rewrite and write an essay.

And is that truly what kind of writing we use today?

Right.

So the on demand writing and the editing and mechanics would not be expected in elementary, middle or high school, and it could shift into a local accountability measure.

And I think as a teacher, as we sit there and give these kids these tests that last 4 or 5 days to be able to decrease how much testing we're having, but then still get enough information that we can know how our students are doing, is definitely a win.

>> When you just said something, I know that lots of parents are probably thinking, is this going to mean less testing time?

>> It would be less testing time.

That's correct.

And I did have a post in a teachers group and there was lots of panic.

You know, if you take away the writing test, is writing not going to be emphasized?

And that couldn't be further from the truth.

I mean, to say to an educator that we don't think you're going to teach writing because it's not on the test is not reasonable.

>> So how would you assess how well a child can write?

Because that is an important communication tool.

>> So the district, each district would be able to figure out their own way, and it could be something that is done over the, you know, multiple times during the year.

So each district would be able to decide, but.

>> They would still have to follow the standards.

>> They.

Would still have to follow the standards.

And I think that the biggest concern from the feedback that I got is that we're in a place with testing, that if it's not tested, people think it doesn't matter.

And there are so many things that matter in school that whether or not they're tested, they matter, right?

We don't test basic reading on our reading test.

We don't test the ability to just pull the words off the page.

But that's the most important thing that kids can do before they learn, you know, to have comprehension.

So I think this is a great bill.

It's the product of a couple of years of really hard work of Commissioner Fletcher in the Kentucky United we learned council.

There are some other pieces that they came up with that hopefully we can work in there either this year or in the future.

But I think, you know, one of the reasons I ran for office is because of how concerned I was about our testing and accountability system, so I'm all for it.

>> Okay.

Chairman West, when this gets to you, what are you going to say or do?

>> What am I going to do?

>> What pieces are you going to add to it?

Right.

>> Right.

>> Right, or take away.

>> We this may be an area where we have some common ground.

We're going to sift through the bill like we do any other bill.

Right.

But this is not a new thing that the KDE they've been working on this three, 4 or 5 years, something like that.

So it's well vetted.

We've heard multiple interim committee meetings about this.

I like the part that you're that represent Representative Bujnowski is specifically talking about where we look more at growth of the student.

I can tell you the Senate perspective is probably we're fine with it, as long as we don't get away from basic accountability.

Right?

You know, we don't want to stray too far away from making sure districts are accountable for the basics, right?

Make sure.

And to her point, we are required by the feds to measure that.

But I'm hopeful.

>> Yeah.

You hopeful, Senator Thomas?

>> First of all, I had to laugh when you interjected quickly.

What?

They have to learn how to write, I said, Renee sound like a true journalist, when she makes that point, right?

You're like a true journalist.

But, you know, it does sound like a good bill.

I mean, this is going to be more labor intensive, I got to tell you, that represents Lewis, because when you start looking at the individual child, as opposed as opposed to collective class or collective school, you know, that's really getting down into the details.

But that's a good thing.

That's a good thing.

Because ultimately, what a parent really cares about is, how is my child doing in school?

So I applaud you for for doing just that.

I applaud you for doing that.

>> But that to your point though, that does mean that KDE or whomever is going to have to have some robust metrics in place, and it's going to be very granular to get to the point of measuring the growth of the.

>> Individual change.

We had growth, so they've already had experience with this.

Now, the commissioner.

>> What's the difference between change and growth for the average viewer?

>> Correct me if I'm wrong.

Change would be one group of third graders compared to a different third grade group, and growth is one group of third graders.

How do those individual third graders grow into fourth grade?

And I believe in the previous regulations, when we had growth, it didn't count as growth unless they bumped up higher than the level they were.

And what I want to see is if a third grader scores proficient in third grade and then scores proficient in fourth grade, they have grown because they're scoring proficient on more difficult content.

So that's the the commissioner affirmed that that was the intent.

And so I look for that to happen.

Another piece that's on this bill that has driven some discussion is that the survey that we did would be replaced with a measure of chronic absenteeism.

>> And chronic absenteeism is defined as.

>> Missing 10% or more, and then it's listed in the bill as excused or unexcused absences.

So, you know, we we do have to get our kids in the schools.

We have to.

But I did have one educator reach out to me and said, we're trying to get them in the schools.

We have to go to the courts and get them in the schools.

If the courts can't get them in the schools, how are we going to?

So there's some concern among educators about that measure.

I think we need to get them in the schools.

I think it's important, and it looks like it might be about a 4% portion of the accountability score, like the survey was in the past.

So it would be a small amount.

So we'll just see what the Senate thinks once we get it through the House.

>> I want to revisit a topic we just talked about because this question or comment came in from Warren County, quote, inflicting more politics into educational leadership is simply unnecessary and has dangerous potential to have the Chamber of Commerce involved in superintendent, quote unquote, training or mayor's appointing board members has no merit.

It simply makes educational leadership more partizan.

I don't see any benefit to students.

>> Part of that is is incorrect.

Actually, I think what they're referring to is a bill we passed off the floor today, Senate bill.

Before I know it's my bill that we passed.

It's on principle leadership training.

So the chamber already does a program in conjunction with Truist that helps train our principals.

So that's what I think the question is with reference to the chamber, with the bill that passed off the floor would be somewhat involved in principle training, not superintendent training.

>> Right?

Right.

Thank you.

>> For clarifying.

The first part of the question was again.

>> That was about that.

And then they went on to say training or mayor's appointing boards has no merit.

Appointing mayors, appointing board members has no merit.

>> I'll just go back to my my comment of earlier.

The idea that 114 is the is the first thing that would inject politics into school boards is is not quite accurate.

There's there's always going to be a certain level of politics there.

And this this just changes the structure of that.

Now the, the person who texted in or chimed in, we can disagree.

They can say it's a bad policy and I we can disagree on that.

And I understand that.

But the idea that this is a new political there's no politics involved in school boards.

>> Might be able to.

>> Agree on accurate.

>> Might be able to agree on that point.

Maybe, perhaps.

Okay.

From Martin rivers in Lexington with the line of reasoning to put CEO like power into superintendents hands, why not take this to the state level and give the governor that same authority over the legislature, concentrate spending power with the executive?

The Jefferson School District is large.

State of Kentucky is larger.

Does this make sense?

Does it make sense?

>> Well, it would probably probably be unconstitutional for us to do that.

So no, I don't think it makes sense.

And the governor, frankly has executive power.

He has a lot of executive power.

>> Perhaps a little bit more diminished than when he started.

>> It is it is much diminished from when he started.

However, with power comes responsibility.

And I think we've seen with this governor, he's responsible for running all of our cabinets properly, making sure those happen.

And frankly, my experience has been very poor with how many of our cabinets are being operated and the laws are being executed.

And so, you know, with power comes responsibility.

And so the reason we're here is, is, is this past track record.

And we're trying to to change the do you know, it's crazy to do the same thing over and over again.

Expect the same result.

Right.

I think Einstein or someone said that.

So so this is an effort by Senator Givens to, to to change change the political dynamic.

Important to point out this is Senator Givens bill that's been filed in the Senate.

Right.

He's one legislator that is allowed to file a bill.

It hasn't gone anywhere.

>> It's still sitting in the Committee on committees.

>> It has not been assigned to a committee Committee.

So it's it's there.

So, so just there's a lot of bills that have been filed and just sitting there.

>> Right.

>> Well, you know, I'm going to say something in support of the governor.

I'll just say it quickly.

Clearly, this governor has done a lot of right things.

He got reelected a couple of years ago, and that says a lot about what the people thought about his first term.

He's getting a lot of good national press for his record here in Kentucky, particularly in the area of economic development and business.

So so he's done a lot of right things, even though, as Senator West admitted, this legislature, the legislature over the past six years have diminished his authority.

They've tried to weaken him, and yet he's still coming out strong and and being applauded by the people of Kentucky and now being applauded by the people across this entire country.

>> We'll talk a little bit more about one of his major initiatives, which is universal pre-K that House and Senate Democrats announced today.

Some takes on what to do there.

But I do want to get to one more bill, perhaps about educator compensation.

And this is about school administrators and superintendents not getting pay increases that outpace that of classroom teachers.

And this may seem like a no brainer for many folks, but I guess the question is, is there not a cap that Senate Republicans would say a superintendent should make?

Period.

>> We we could do that.

>> Or administrators.

>> Administrators, administrators.

>> Has that been discussed?

Is there a concern that Yearwood or Doctor Demetrus Liggins with Fayette County make too much money?

>> There's been talk of that.

You know, some if you look at some of these compensation packages, especially the fringe, the fringe parts, there has been a lot of discussion of of how rich that is and what, you know, especially after they leave office or leave leave superintendent status that would it cost the pension system to pay them for the rest of their life?

There's always talk about those type of things.

I haven't really gotten personally too excited about these things.

These people hold positions of power and authority, great responsibility, great responsibility, and so.

>> And answerable to hundreds.

>> Answerable to a lot of people.

And their their contracts aren't always for long periods of time.

Right.

So a lot of times the lifespan of a superintendent isn't isn't always a long period of time.

So I don't get too excited about that.

But I think this is center Julie Raque Adams bill that we're talking about, Senate Bill two.

And the idea is not maybe not necessarily always superintendents, but that that that central office part of the equation seems to have grown in a lot of districts, kind of maybe beyond where it should be.

And so it's aimed at central office administrators, which would include superintendents.

But I think that's what it's aimed at is if, let's the money that's going into these districts, either through SEEK or other other, other forms, let's, let's try to funnel more of that down to your front line teacher, the one that's really going to make the difference and move, move kids forward.

>> I so I just have a thought listening because we've talked about Senate Bill one and giving more authority to the superintendent as chief executive officer of the district with a 1.5 billion budget, I'd like to see what a private sector CEO earns and compare that to what our superintendents are paid.

I'd much rather have a study that gives them a market rate for their position.

It's hard to find a superintendent.

I think Representative Willner was on a superintendent search committee when she was on the JCPS school board, and we need to pay people what we need to pay, just like the private sector, in order to keep good people in the position.

So I would like to see something where it's more of a study and how how does how do these responsibilities compare to private sector, and how is the pay balanced between those averages?

>> 3.5 years, I think, unless the superintendent.

>> Yeah, yeah.

>> And then also I may add to that I'll have to look at the bill.

But districts are paid off of a salary schedule.

So you can't if you give a pay raise of say, 3%, that has to go to every single employee.

And same thing with classified.

If you get a 3% classified employees, it goes to every single one.

So the superintendent might be the only one that's really outside of that with the contract and to Representative Sinofsky's thought there on pay, you know, we probably need to look and see what a similar size district in another state pays and see if it's in the ballpark.

That's what I would do if I was a board member.

>> That's who they're competing against.

>> Yeah, because you are you're competing in a market that has gotten a lot smaller in the last ten years for principals, for teachers, for superintendents.

So it's not just the administrators, it's teachers too.

If we don't if we don't match what a private pays for a teacher, sometimes we don't get them either.

So just a couple of thoughts.

>> To be clear, Renee, for the audience out there, all this is handled currently by school boards.

And so the legislature does not set pay rates for superintendents.

Those are all individual decisions by the various districts.

And so if they can, they can form their own search committees and they can look and they can use some of what representative is talking about currently.

They can make their own decisions, pretty much pay whatever they want to pay.

>> And there are some exceptions in the bill to allow a superintendent or administrator to make hire get a higher increase than what is being given to classroom teachers.

In a certain.

>> Way, the bill is drafted.

If a district feels like, you know, this is the person we have to have and it's essential for our district, all they have to do is apply to the school board for a waiver, and most likely that will be granted.

>> As I read the bill, it doesn't limit an initial salary.

What it does is it limits percentage pay increases, right?

>> Right, right.

>> So if you have to pay X number of dollars to hire someone, it wouldn't limit from my reading of the bill you from doing that.

>> Right.

Right.

Just their increase.

They just couldn't get a 20% if the others are getting 3% right.

That's true.

So let's talk about in the time we have remaining Parikh getting back to perhaps the governor's, one of his main initiatives since he has taken office and and today Senate Democrats and House Democrats.

And I'll defer to Representative Bujnowski first.

What's the plan?

What are you proposing this time?

And do you think it's more palatable than what's been proposed by the governor?

>> Well, so we have filed two different bills, and I filed HB 572 and Rep Don worth filed HB 574.

And they are both to increase the number of children who have access to early childhood preschool education.

My bill expands a program we currently have where children can have their household income can be up to 160% of the federal poverty rate, and it increases that to 250%.

So it's just an expansion.

Don Wirth's bill would be universal pre-K, so it would offer pre-K to all four year olds.

>> Who want it, whose parents want it.

It's not mandatory.

>> Mandatory.

It would be an opt in.

I think one thing that's really interesting about these bills is that they both have what's called a teaming partner, and that is effectively a public private partnership where schools can subcontract with child care providers.

So if I'm a parent and I'm working full time, I might not have the time to drop my child to preschool and pick them up from preschool.

They may need all day.

Child care, and child care centers can contract if the district chooses to, with local districts, and can run part of these programs through those programs.

The other piece is that my bill has a six year time in between when we file, when we would pass the bill, and when this would have to take effect.

So if you have a district where you might need to increase capacity to be able to house the classrooms, you have plenty of time to work that all out before before your.

Required six years, right?

So there has been an appetite in this body for an increase to 200%.

There has been a bill filed by a Republican in our chamber to increase that.

In 2016.

We had a bill that passed both chambers before I was there, president Stivers Speaker Osborne voted for it to increase to 200%.

And then Governor Matt Bevin, Line-item vetoed it.

So, you know, the research is there, that early childhood education is where we're going to get the most bang for our buck.

And one of the conversations we had this afternoon was just how many children come into school who aren't potty trained, who are not potty trained, who come to kindergarten, and they're not special education students, but they don't they haven't learned toileting yet.

And so that's just an example of how we really need to better prepare our preschool students for K through 12 education.

>> So before I hear from what the Senate Democrats are proposing, this question response from Richmond.

Given the widespread poverty and poor educational outcomes across the Commonwealth, high quality universal pre-K education taught by all Caps certified teachers and operated by school districts in parentheses, Knott private daycare would be the single most effective approach to improving education throughout the Commonwealth.

Why has this not been adopted immediately?

Why is this in any way controversial?

Can you answer that with what the Senate Democrats are proposing?

>> Well, we're proposing the same kind of two part strategy that Representative Bogdanovsky took place.

And I want to go back to something Representative Lewis said, because I think I think he said it better than than I could say it when we were talking earlier and we were talking about, I think House Bill 257 Representative Lewis said.

And I'm quoting here, I would like to see us do more with our early grades.

And this is what Governor Beshear has been pushing since he came into office back in 2019, that we need we need universal pre-K.

He's been saying that, and we do Renee as we sit now and and represent Bozinovski laid out all the reasons why, as we sit here now, the majority of states in this country have some form of universal pre-K.

We do not.

Five of the seven states that are contiguous to us have universal pre-K, but we do not.

Why do we have to lag behind?

Our children lag behind in trying to do the best we can to see them do more?

In the early grades?

It's way past time, Renee, that we move this forward.

I again, I fully agree with that.

With that listener said that we've got to do this if we really want to see our children compete, not just here in Kentucky, not just here in America, but across the world, we've got to get them to school.

Earlier.

>> Chairman West, as as Representative Borowski pointed out, in 2016, a measure to expand pre-K was passed by Republicans.

Then they voted for that.

Why not now?

>> I think I want to differentiate.

There's two distinct differences here.

So there's a difference between gently expanding the poverty level for existing pre-K funds.

But there's a huge difference between that and universal pre-K.

Okay.

So we're talking apples and oranges and two two distinct differences.

And so I cannot explain what the reasoning was of Governor Bevin at the time except to say, well, I can add one thing.

Our budget was in dire straits in 2016.

We had huge investments we need to make make in Kentucky Teachers Retirement System, which we did.

Our credit rating had been dropping.

And so he didn't just veto that.

We had significant cuts to other budget areas, post-secondary, for instance.

And so it was a different time as far as the budget goes, if we go into universal pre-K, the person who emailed in, I can answer that question specifically.

It's it's money, like a funds to do that.

I've, I personally spoke with the governor's people on you know we see your proposal.

Where's the money coming from.

Where is the money coming from for your proposal.

And they told me it was coming from the sports gaming funds and the lottery funds.

Okay.

There's two problems with that.

The sports gaming funds are currently in the permanent pension fund.

And so those funds are earmarked to go to pay for pension debt.

And so do you want to pay for this through pension funds?

That's kind of what you're going to have to answer there.

Secondly, the lottery funds, all the lottery funds are already delineated for different budget items, mainly education related items like scholarship, post-secondary scholarships and those things.

So we haven't had an answer on where the money's coming from.

The governor's office has told us we think it will cost $120 million for universal pre-K.

I don't think that even begins to touch it.

I think, personally, I think that you're more in the 4 to $500 million range.

>> And real quickly, representative Bozinovski, how much would your plan cost?

Do you know, just a.

>> Few estimate for 572 is 10 million in the first year to set up a computer database system so we can track how the program is working.

And then 40.5 million in recurring funds to provide access for 9683 children.

>> Okay.

Well, this is an issue we're going to have to take up again at another time.

So we didn't get to a lot of issues, but I think education is really going to dominate.

So there'll be plenty of opportunities for us to talk about these issues and much more.

And our coverage of the 2026 Kentucky General Assembly is on every weeknight at 630 eastern, 530 Central on Kentucky edition.

We break it all down for you.

And then, of course, Bill Bryant.

A team of journalists are here on Friday nights to walk you through it all.

Again, thanks for watching tonight.

I'm Renee Shaw and I'll see you tomorrow night.