{"id":11135,"date":"2024-06-10T15:54:51","date_gmt":"2024-06-10T15:54:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=11135"},"modified":"2024-06-10T15:58:45","modified_gmt":"2024-06-10T15:58:45","slug":"explain-it-to-me-literacy-law-implementation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=11135","title":{"rendered":"Explain it to Me: Literacy Law Implementation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at <a href=\"https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/explain-it-to-me-literacy-law-implementation\/\">https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/explain-it-to-me-literacy-law-implementation\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><b>Explain it to Me: Literacy Law Implementation<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Background<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span>In late 2022, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/2022-10-26-IRG-Get-Right-on-Reading-FINAL.pdf\"><span>IRG released a comprehensive plan<\/span><\/a><span> outlining how to fundamentally transform the way children are taught how to read in Wisconsin. After years of other states passing Wisconsin in national reading rankings \u2013 rural, urban, and every demographic \u2013 reading in Wisconsin needs an overhaul. Lawmakers agreed and quickly set to work crafting legislation that would do just that. After passing <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/docs.legis.wisconsin.gov\/2023\/proposals\/ab321\"><span>Assembly Bill 321<\/span><\/a><span>, the Governor signed the bill (2023 Act 20) in July of 2023. In the state budget, the legislature set aside $50 million to be allocated by the Joint Finance Committee at the request of the Department of Public Instruction for the implementation of the bill.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Later in the session, it became clear that there needed to be more written into the law to ensure that the funding could be allocated for the implementation of Act 20. However, when signing this bill, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/docs.legis.wisconsin.gov\/2023\/proposals\/sb971\"><span>Act 100<\/span><\/a><span>, the Governor made it immensely more complicated when he partially vetoed this legislation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Governor\u2019s Partial Veto<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span>Governor Evers used his powerful veto pen to partial veto Act 100, stripping the specified appropriations originally laid out in the bill and instead giving DPI one \u201clump sum\u201d literacy appropriation. This means that the legislature\u2019s original intent to have money allocated by purpose (curriculum replacement, retraining programs, coaching) was removed. In practice, this gives DPI more discretion as to how they use the funding. The Governor claimed that because the bill falls under ch. 20 of state statutes, he has authority to partially veto the legislation as if it were a budget bill. In response to his veto, the legislature sued the Governor, claiming that he does not have the authority to partially veto the bill because there is no actual funding in the bill. Representative Joel Kitchens, the primary author of Act 20, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/hidKS5Hi-ow?si=JQsXulwY9o6AtEp0&amp;t=81\"><span>pointed out<\/span><\/a><span> the unprecedented reach of the Governor\u2019s power.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Current Status<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span>The Wisconsin Legislature has <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wpr.org\/news\/wisconsin-legislature-sues-evers-dpi-over-reading-bill\"><span>sued<\/span><\/a><span> over Act 20 and DPI has <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/dpi.wi.gov\/news\/releases\/2024\/counterclaim-act-20-statement\"><span>countersued<\/span><\/a><span>. The resolution of the powers of the Governor\u2019s office will be determined in court.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>In the meantime, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/dpi.wi.gov\/wi-reads\/act-20-faq\"><span>DPI<\/span><\/a><span> and Rep. Kitchens alike have assured schools that money will be there for later reimbursements of curriculum and retraining. Both have said the primary delay will be of the head of the Office of Literacy as well as coaches, which would need to be paid salaries from those funds. However, because coaching is supposed to come after schools have purchased new materials and provided science-based professional development to teachers, this is not a crisis for children.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at https:\/\/reforminggovernment.org\/explain-it-to-me-literacy-law-implementation\/ Explain it to Me: Literacy Law Implementation Background In&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":3264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-institute-for-reforming-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11135"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11135\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11136,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11135\/revisions\/11136"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}