The Legislature is debating many important issues about education from teacher shortages to funding formulas to testing students to make sure they’ve learned what they should.

Sen. Pam Roach, R-Auburn, had one more she thought the state should address: Cursive writing. Or rather, the lack of it.

“Something happened when we weren’t looking,” she told the Early Learning and K-12 Education Committee. “They took cursive writing out of schools. Nobody voted to take that out.”

Time strapped schools apparently have abandoned it, and she worried that without a knowledge of cursive, grandchildren won’t be able to read letters from their grandmothers. It’s like “taking away half a language,” she said.

Unfortunately, the good penmanship industry has no lobbyist in Olympia. Roach’s bill didn’t get voted out of committee by Friday’s deadline, so it’s likely dead.

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