South Carolina Pre-Filed Education Bills

Today’s piece is available for free from the Center for Educator Wellness and Learning (CEWL). See a list of bills identified by the ProTruth South Carolina coalition here.

I also wrote a piece about labor unions for CEWL over the break. You can check that one out for free at this link.

Leading up to the start of each session, South Carolina legislators offer up pre-filed bills.

Some of these bills are serious attempts at creating law and policy; others are political stunts designed to get attention and online clicks, or to satisfy lobbyists and special interest groups, or to offer an opportunity for debate in committees or on the floor of the state House or Senate.

Some of these bills will ultimately become law. Others will be referred to committees to die unceremoniously, without any public comment.

At this point, it’s largely hard to predict which will be which.

As usual, many of the pre-filed bills focus on educational policy, and range from some that seem designed to sincerely address real problems in the education system (such as H. 3210, by Rep. Neal Collins, which limits teacher “other duties as assigned”) to some which seem geared only at adding fuel to the fire of extremist talking points (such as Rep. Josiah Manguson’s H. 3185, which turns the temporary budget proviso used to ban books like Between the World and Me into permanent law).

A “neo-voucher” bill.

Donna Barton, who drafted S. 62, the neo-voucher bill that would use South Carolina Education Lottery funds to pay for private school services, explains the bill. To her left, Senate Education Chair Greg Hembree, who has fast-tracked the bill.

Read more about the first meeting for that bill here:

This rest if today’s piece is available for free from the Center for Educator Wellness and Learning.