SCHOOL STANDARDS

Missouri's new academic performance standards, dubbed the Show Me Standards by the State Board of Education that adopted them, have hit yet another bump in their long and rocky road. The story of this latest setback for Missouri's misbegotten education reforms is an interesting one.

When a state agency such as the State Board of Education proposes new rules, statutes provide that they be subject to review by a joint House-Senate committee called the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules. Within a 30-day period after the board adopts them, this committee has the authority to suspend the rules, pending their consideration by both houses of the General Assembly.

In January, senators who are critical of the so-called standards asked for and got a hearing on this proposed set of rules for all Missouri schools. The hearing, chaired by Sen. Jerry Howard, D-Dexter, heard witnesses both for and against the standards. At the conclusion of testimony, without considering the substantive issue that was the purpose of the hearing, chairman Howard gaveled the committee to adjournment on a straight, party-line vote. That, one might have thought, was the end of that. The standards went into effect.

As a joint committee, this particular one doesn't meet according to any regular schedule. It convenes when business warrants. As a result, the committee didn't meet again until last week. As the committee went into executive session to discuss business, an alert Sen. Steve Ehlmann, R-St. Charles, moved to suspend the rule on the so-called standards. Catching Howard off guard, Ehlmann pressed his motion, which won by a vote of 6-3, with two Democrats joining all Republican members in opposing the standards.

It isn't clear what legal effect the committee's vote will have, inasmuch as the standards took effect upon the committee's having failed to act last winter. Sen. Ehlmann and his allies may press for consideration of the committee's action at the September veto session, but questions exist as to whether such an attempt would be in order at that time. Failing that, senators critical of the standards can be expected to press their attack when the General Assembly reconvenes in January.

As lawmakers ponder these issues, they might consider the verdict of Albert Shanker, the nationally famous president of the American Federation of Teachers and no conservative. Shanker spoke in St. Louis in March. Reporting on his remarks, left-wing labor columnist Phillip Dine wrote, "Shanker sharply panned Missouri's recently adopted performance standards as the fuzziest in the nation, calling them so vague that no teacher could possibly understand what he or she is supposed to be doing based on them."