Washington education measures to help disadvantaged students

SEATTLE – Gov. Jay Inslee signed two education bills in Seattle on Wednesday, both aimed at helping disadvantaged kids get a better education.

He signed a measure that will help improve education for foster youth just after noon at a luncheon at the Seattle Sheraton. Then he visited a Seattle middle school to sign a bill aimed at closing the educational opportunity gap.

House Bill 1451 is aimed at closing the achievement gap between students of different ethnic group.

The measure calls for an end to long-term and open-ended suspensions and expulsions. It also improves bilingual instruction and asks for more cultural competency training for educators.

Washington state has one of the largest achievement or opportunity gaps in the nation.

Ending long-term suspensions and expulsions is expected to help because minority students are disproportionately punished in this way. Educators and advocates like to say that students can’t learn if they aren’t in the classroom.

House Bill 1999 tells education and child welfare agencies to work together to help foster kids get a better education. It moves administration of education programs to help foster kids work toward college into the education department.

The governor is scheduled to take action on a bill aimed at helping homeless students on Friday at an elementary school in Tacoma. House Bill 1682 would pay for more educational, housing, health care and counseling support for homeless students.

It would also provide for more data collection and reporting on homeless children by the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Inslee has not scheduled action on the bill designed to save Washington’s charter schools, but has until Saturday to sign or veto that measure and others on his desk.