A bill focusing on early education continues to wind its way through the West Virginia Senate.
The Senate Education Committee this week advanced SB 274 to the Finance Committee.
Also known as the Third Grade Success Act, the bill would retool the state’s approach to early education in an effort to close the gap in reading and math scores, which were below average in the last National Assessment of Educational Progress.
The legislation’s lead sponsor, Senate Education Committee Chairwoman Amy Grady, R-Mason, said the bill outlines a multi-faceted framework for early education.
The bill would place early childhood classroom assistant teachers in every kindergarten through third-grade classroom. This would take effect July 1, 2023, for kindergarten and on July 1 of the following two years for second and third grades, respectively.
The bill would phase in increases in the service personnel funding ratio to ensure sufficient financing for county boards of education to hire assistant teachers. But staffing is only one component of the bill, Grady said.
“It does so much more than that,” she said.
The bill would establish professional development for educators, including assistant teachers, that would help them use approved benchmark assessments conducted three times a year to identify student deficiencies in reading and math. It also would provide training to help early educators identify the characteristics of dyslexia and dyscalculia, a math learning disorder.
“This would allow them to go through the same training that teachers do,” Grady said.
State schools Superintendent David Roach said the legislation would improve reading skills outcomes for students because it is based around the science of reading, which focuses on phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. The science of reading is at the center of Roach’s recently launched early reading initiative — Ready, Read, Write, West Virginia.
“We’re thrilled with the potential of what this could do for our children,” Roach said.
Over the past 30 years, some of the components of the science of reading have been left out of early education, Roach said.
“We have seen the results nationwide,” he said.
According to the bill, effective July 1, 2026, students who have not corrected reading deficiencies by the end of third grade could be retained upon recommendation from their teacher and student assistance team.
“It is very clear that if a child is not reading at a third-grade level, you lose them exponentially through the system. What you also find is you’ll find them in your court system and you’ll find them in your prisons,” Sen. Bob Plymale, D-Wayne, said.
Sen. Laura Chapman, R-Ohio, said she noticed a gap with her own children when COVID-19 shut down schools and online learning became a routine part of education in the state.
“With the school shutdowns, I noticed a learning loss with them. My son’s in kindergarten and he’s now learning to read, but it was a struggle. I was just wondering if you had any opinion on the urgency of this,” Chapman asked Roach.
“Every child that cannot read, in my opinion, is doomed. They have little chance of success as we sitting around here know it. I think that’s on us,” Roach said. “They can learn anything if they have the ability to read.”
Sen. Charles Trump, R-Morgan, was enthusiastic about the bill.
“I think this bill gets right to the heart of it,” he said. “It’s gonna cost a bit of money. I’m hoping that we’re able to do this in our budget. This bill is going to put money right into the classrooms. Right on the front line of what we have to do.”
