Idaho Legislature: Ask Legislators to VOTE NO on H0383 - Education, literacy (posted 03/14/25)

• Bill: legislature.idaho.gov/s…

• Contact Legislators (linked below):

(Check the linked page or use My Bill Tracker for the bill’s current status.)

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H0383 is meant to improve reading skills for K-3 students. Unfortunately, it's another costly attempt to fix an education system that already has prodigious money pouring in. Our cohorts from the 1950s had excellent teachers who employed simple, time-tested approaches that worked – without "science of reading," “literacy experts,” and other pricey, failed education attempts that came and went over decades.

Idaho’s prior literacy approaches haven’t worked, though they likely were touted as the latest and greatest at the time. Because 40.5% of K-3 students still aren’t reading at grade level, Idaho wants to try another expensive approach. H0383’s SOP states that it:

1. Aligns Idaho law with Science of Reading standards.

2. Allows school districts to select the “most effective” reading assessments for measuring student growth rather than using one-size-fits-all tests. (Do they really know what’s effective?)

3. Funds a curated list of digital interventions.

4. Establishes intensive turnaround interventions for Idaho's lowest-performing schools, pairing schools with outside literacy experts to develop and implement comprehensive improvement plans along with administrators, teachers, and school districts.

Details:

• Defines "science of reading" and "three-cueing system" (now disallowed, but previously favored as “scientific”).

• Mandates that reading instruction align with “evidence-based” practices. (Same evidence-based fallacy used in medicine now.)

• Implements new approach to reading assessments, with schools selecting from state-approved “summative” assessments (education jargon!).

• Board of Education defines which schools participate in turnaround interventions and selects outside literacy experts (public money going to favored, private companies!).

• Independent literacy experts conduct comprehensive needs assessments, develop school-specific literacy plans, and provide professional development. (DoE should be doing this already. Why must taxpayers fund outside literacy experts to assess each failing school?)

• Literacy experts assess needs, develop a Literacy Plan, and provide training, coaching, and support for three years.

Fiscal Highlights:

• Expected annual cost: $8-$10 million.

• Funding licenses for state approved interventions: $3-5 million annually.

• 50% of literacy expert fees guaranteed, 50% tied to success.

• Literacy experts receive $100,000 per school per year for three years to implement Literacy Plan, with $300,000 bonus for schools meeting success criteria by year three.

• Number of schools selected each year determined by appropriated dollars.