Thread by @TracyNovick

Okay, the House is going to take up a "foundation budget reform" bill, we're told.

For what should #MAEdu be watching?

Well, the first thing is, while we may pick it up, so far the House is being pretty careful about references to the Commission (which I'm echoing by not tagging them with #FBRC).

Where's the references to the Commission?
Three years out.
Work of more than a year.
Hours and hours of testimony.
Pages and pages of research.
Hours and hours of discussion.

And so far, it looks like there's some careful dancing around that.

Now why is that?

I suspect it's because we're not going to see real #FBRC implementation.

#FBRC, as you might remember, had four main parts plus a few more "hey, pay attention" pieces and a data section.

Lots of us have worried right along that it would be chopped up.

Why?

Not everyone benefits the same from the ELL and low income sections.

Why?

Because not all districts have the same proportion of ELL and low income kids.

(we could do that "Why?" on another thread. Our districts are pretty stunningly segregated, though.)

BUT that means that, well, I'll let Homer take this:

Hmm.

Claims of "equal" and "fair" aren't what this is about, though.

This is about meeting kids' needs.

That's what "among the different orders of the people" in the state constitution means. In 1779, the state recognized that we had different needs among our students.

We may be told we don't know enough to complete those parts.

Please read the report.
(which was passed unanimously)

It's alllll been researched.
It's alllll been backed up.

And kids don't get this time back.

"the ELL population has nearly doubled from 45,400 in 1998 to 90,200 in 2017"
(that's @MassBudget)
"close to one in seven children in Massachusetts lives in poverty, and is at risk for a wide variety of lifelong challenges"
(also @MassBudget)

So if you say "we can't put real numbers in for poor kids and kids learning English," what does that say?

Yeah.
Nothing good.

Does the Mass House reeeeeeeally want to pass something that leaves out the needs of our poorest kids? Our kids learning English?
Now?

Watch for that.
If it isn't in the bill, add it.

Don't leave our neediest kids behind. #FBRC

@threadreaderapp unroll if you would please