Representative Graning introduced the House Education Committee to her bill, H.258, which she claims is to support high quality public education. The bill effectively restricts public tuition to the four traditional academies, which essentially removes school choice for students that reside in districts that do not operate a school. She admitted that this bill was about stopping the “siphoning of money” away from public schools.

Mary Newman (Head of School, Sharon Academy) introduced her school and the students that were with her. Eighth grader Chloe Evans was the first student to testify. Chairman Campion asked what she likes about the school, what she doesn’t like, and what her message was to the Committee. Evans shared that she feels like there is a misconception that independent schools are just for rich kids and that has not been her experience. She was bullied and mistreated at her last public school because minorities were not widely accepted there. She has diagnosed trauma and would often fake sickness so she didn’t have to go to that school. She didn’t know a school couldn’t be so supportive until she was at Sharon Academy. She didn’t know there was a place she could feel at home before her current school.

The Senate Education Committee revisited Education Quality Standards (EQSs) on Wednesday with Heather Bouchey (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Education).

On Tuesday, Representative Jerome presented her bill, H.228, which would require high school juniors and seniors to receive financial literacy instruction as a condition of graduation.

On Tuesday, Representative Elder introduced his bill, H.179, that re-organizes the State Board of Education (SBE). He believes it is important to recognize that the SBE is staffed by the Agency of Education (AOE). The bill largely re-introduces language from a 2020 Senate bill – S.166. He thinks it’s confusing to the public, saying that he thinks “it’s good to say the Secretary is in charge.” He believes it is not too late to make this structural change. The SBE has only acted independently for a dozen years or so. He also asserted that the Agency would support this bill.

The House Government Operations Committee took up a draft elections bill on Tuesday that would, among other things, ban fusion candidates.

Brad James shared with the House Ways & Means Committee on Tuesday that now 73% of districts are reporting (a significant jump from last week). With the latest budgets, the Agency is now showing an 8.2% increase from FY2024. Champlain Valley and Burlington are still not in yet, which are both large budgets and could sway the final numbers. James noted that if both went up by 10% it would increase the statewide average to 8.4%.

Matt Dunne testified in front of the Senate Economic Development Committee Friday morning.

Key takeaways:

• Flexibility is needed
• Every community is different
• There have been significant shifts in winners/losers over the past 40 years

The Senate Economic Development Committee heard from more experts on Friday regarding their Omnibus Housing Bill.

Key Takeaways:

• Permitting takes too long and is duplicative.
• The housing market is changing.
• Vermonters support expanding population and housing.

The Senate Natural Resources Committee came back to S.5 on Thursday for mark-up of the bill. Chairman Bray thought they were dealing with mostly just minor corrections at this point, fixing typos and minor date changes, etc. Larger discussion points were deferred until later.