Republicans in Indiana still can’t get over the fact that the voters elected Glenda Ritz as state commissioner of education in 2012 and tossed out their idol, Tony Bennett, who outspent Ritz 10-1.
Ritz won more votes than Governor Mike Pence.
Ever since the election, Pence has tried to take away the powers of the office of state commissioner of education and transfer them to the state board of education, which he controls.
Here is the latest maneuver.
If you live in Indiana, please take action to stop this blatant power grab!
Tell your representatives to respect the democratic process.
Here is an immediate call to action for this weekend:The House Education Committee will hear HB1320 at their 8:30 meeting on Monday morning. It creates a statewide student record repository which puts student records and data in the hands of the state board of education. The State Board is staffed by the Center for Education & Career Innovation (CECI), Gov. Pence’s new layer of bureaucracy designed to bypass Glenda Ritz and the Department of Education. According to the fiscal note, security issues and the sensitivity of the data could potentially require the State Board to establish a new stand alone computer system to implement the requirements of this bill. Initial estimates of such a computer system are approximately $3.7 million. Funds for the record repository would have to be appropriated by the legislature in the next budget. Student data is currently in held in the Department of Education and is the key to where federal grants and other funds flow. If this bill passes, it could change that flow to CECI instead of Glenda Ritz’s department.
Let the members of the committee know you see HB1320 as a power grab to bypass the elected Superintendent of Public Instruction Glenda Ritz and ask them to oppose it.
The members are:
Rep. Robert Behning, Chairman (email: h91@iga.in.gov)
Rep. Rhonda Rhoads, Vice Chr. (email: h70@iga.in.gov )
Rep, Vernon Smith, Ranking Minority Member (email: h14@iga.in.gov )
Rep. Lloyd Arnold (email: larnold@iga.in.gov )Rep. Kreg Battles (h45@iga.in.gov)Rep. Woody Burton,(h58@iga.in.gov )Rep. Ed Clere (h72@iga.in.gov)Rep Dale DeVon ( ddevon@iga.in.gov )Rep. Sue Errington (serringt@iga.in.gov )Rep. Todd Huston ( thuston@iga.in.gov )Rep. Jim Lucas (jlucas@iga.in.gov )Rep. Jeffrey Thompson ( h28@iga.in.gov )Rep Shelli VanDenburgh ( h19@iga.in.gov)
The House Switchboard # is 1-800-382-9842 but is not staffed over the weekend and doesn’t take messages. You may be able to call first thing on Monday morning and leave messages for all of these folks.
Please write to all of your friends and let them know about this bill. We need to network.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
What a bunch of crooks. I hope everyone who reads this blog reads the letter to the editor in the link I’ve provided. The people of this country are fed up. It is time for change. This letter is from a town not too far from Indiana. I have no doubt the people of Indiana are fed-up too!
http://www.chillicothegazette.com/article/20140125/OPINION03/301250008/An-open-letter-public-school-system?nclick_check=1
https://ista-in.org/bill-seeks-to-blame-ips-staff-for-school-gradesgives-ips-board-authority-to-give-away-students-and-teachers-to-outside-companies
Reblogged this on Middletown Voice.
Reblogged this on Saint Simon Common Core Information and commented:
Indiana readers take action!
The only solution is revolution!
My words of Today:
“Mike Pence
Likes power dispense
Hence spikes Ritz
as a coward offense”
And to think he may be a potential runner as a presidential candidate
Encourage Ballard to run for Governor. He could unseat Pence. Problem solved.
Sounds like what I call “Petulant Government” and resembles a 3rd grader’s temper tantrum. (Sigh) So much for the “adults being in charge”.
As a member of the Indiana State Board of Education, I, too, was concerned when HB1320 was brought to my attention this weekend. The State Board of Education is not an agency, but rather a policy setting body. I then made some inquiries that resulted in speaking with the Bill’s sponsor, Rep. Bob Behning. HB1320 was amended by the Indiana House Education Committee this morning to accurately reflect the Department’s role in managing student data, not the State Board of Education. I was told the bill was drafted and filed based on similar legislation from other states and it was not intended to be used as a “power grab”. To my knowledge, the Governor’s Office nor CECI Staff was involved with this Bill. Foruntately, the House Committee amended the bill and hopefully we can continue on a course of cooperative efforts to work with Supt. Ritz to improve education in Indiana for all children. The legislative intent of HB1320 is to give parents access to data already gathered and reported to the Department of Education on their child. It is important that as we work through education policy in Indiana, we not jump to conclusions until making the critical inquiries and gather all the facts. While I understand how the draft of this Bill caused concern, I am equally concerned that social media postings were devoid of any fact checking.
So this is what our votes get? Goverment for the parties and not the people. I feel that with all this bickering we lose site of what is important. As a parent I was recently told by a school administrator that their job was to protect the teachers. This after my child had veiwed something I did not agree with them seeing. My initial thought was that wow what happened to protecting the child but after seeing what our elected officals do and how they spend their days I can actually see why the adminitrator said that. He is just following their example. If you do not like what the other party is doing waste time money and the voters patients to bypass the voters. I really am looking forward to the next ellections maybe all the voters will come together and just remove these opsticals to our cummunities growth.
From Twitter today: Oops. Key distinction these days. MT @ericweddle Behning (bill author) said he wrote HB1320 wrong. Intended IDOE – not SBOE – to increase data collection.
Also: Rep. Behning (bill’s author) holds HB1320 for vote until next meeting. Changing bill language from SBOE to DOE really surprised everyone there to fight it.
Here’s a link to a brief on the bill:
http://legiscan.com/IN/bill/HB1320/2014
It looks like Gates has his dirty little fingers in this–gathering more information for…what? or perhaps I should say…who? What kind of information are they gathering? Who will benefit from gathering this information?
The bill does not tell us. Highly suspicious.
More here:
http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2014/01/indiana-hb1320-alec-bill-gates-rupert.html
Dr. Oliver (above): “I was told the bill was drafted and filed based on similar legislation from other states…”
This has ALEC written all over it!