Governor Daniels's State of the State Address

Our call for major change in our system of education... is rooted in a love for our schools, for those who run them, and for those who teach in them... It is rooted most deeply in a love for the children whose very lives and futures depend on the quality of learning they either do or do not acquire while in our schools... Nothing matters more than that.  Nothing compares to that.

-Governor Mitch Daniels (R)-IN

     To start examining the potential for the Indiana General Assembly for 2011, we must first look at Governor Mitch Daniels's State of the State Address.  Delivered on January 11, 2011, this yearly address allows the governor to discuss the successes of the previous year and highlight his desires for 2011, including his goals for the General Assembly.  This 33-minute video is definitely worth your time, especially if you are a Hoosier.  The first three minutes are just applause, and if you are just interested in the education part, skip to 16:24. 
     Education reform is clearly a central goal for Governor Daniels in 2011, as he spent virtually the entire second half of his speech discussing it.  He discussed how international students, from Japan to Slovakia, have higher academic performance rates than Hoosier students.  Daniels explained that poor schools slow economic development, because corporations do not want to locate in an area where its employees will have to send their children to poorly-performing schools.  He also notes that teacher quality is twenty-times more important than any other factor in determining student success.  In his speech, he listed several different goals for the General Assembly:

• Teachers should earn tenure by proving their ability to help kids learn - and not simply through seniority.
• The Indiana Department of Education and General Assembly should place more control in the hands of local school boards and not in the hands of the state or unions.
• Students who complete high school one year early should be permitted to apply the funding that would have been used on their fourth year of high school toward the tuition of a post-secondary institution.
• Competing public schools that have more applicants than seats available should be required to use a lottery or other system involving random selection for choosing the students they accept into their school.
• Charter schools should have the right to utilize vacant public school buildings if they are in need of room for expansion.
• Parents should be allowed to choose where to send their children to school - even if it means allowing the use of their child's state funding in a non-government school.

Governor Daniels has some pretty high aspirations for education reform in 2011.  Let's see what the General Assembly does to accomplish these goals.  More importantly, let's see what bills actually pass through the General Assembly to accomplish these goals.