Inside Report for April 24, 2008
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A House committee’s rejection of a bill to toughen passing grades for high school athletes and others was amazing on several levels.
First, it got an unusually hostile reception from a seemingly friendly source: the House Education Committee.
Rep. Don Trahan, R-Lafayette and chairman of the committee, opposed the measure. Rep. Austin Badon, D-New Orleans and vice chairman of the panel, made the motion to shelve it.
And the vote happened so fast that it appeared the bill never had a chance despite a substantive hearing.
Under law, middle and high school athletes, and others who take part in extracurricular activities, have to earn at least a 1.5 GPA on a 4.0 scale.
That amounts to a midlevel “D,” at least by traditional grading rules. The 1.5 qualifying rule has not been changed in nearly a quarter of a century.
Rep. Rickey Hardy, D-Lafayette, proposed raising the bar to 2.0, with several concessions.
An amendment would have required the new rules to be phased in over three years, which means they would not have taken full effect until the 2012-13 school year. The GPA would have applied to all classes, not the tougher standard of core academic subjects only.
Students in grades 6 to 12 would have been covered.
The panel rejected House Bill 128 on April 10, with seven members voting “yes” and 10 opposed.
The rejection of the bill prevents a full debate in the House.
It also flies in the face of Louisiana’s decade-long push to improve public schools.
The requirement that fourth- and eighth-graders pass a test called LEAP for promotion is sort of the symbol of that push.
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