ED, Less Red Tape bill goes to Governor

Sen. Kimberly Lightford is the lead Senate sponsor of the bill to reduce bureaucratic requirements on schools.

According to Governor Rod Blagojevich's press release the bill incluses:

School/District improvement plans: School districts across Illinois are struggling to comply with the federal mandates set out in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). SB 2829 eliminates several state-imposed planning burdens and allows ISBE to better support districts’ efforts to implement NCLB. It also eliminates duplicative requirements associated with the school and district improvement planning processes.

Reporting, Fiscal and Administrative Requirements. The state should not mandate reporting from school districts and teachers unless the benefits of receiving the information outweigh the burdens on districts to provide it. Some statutory reporting requirements fail this test. A number of other statutory requirements can be revised to reduce the administrative and financial burdens on school districts associated with publishing financial information in newspapers, administering building code requirements, and obtaining waivers and modifications of School Code mandates.

What do the educators think of this bill?