Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jay Inslee unveiled an education plan that calls for reducing K-3 class sizes, boosts innovation schools and provides all-day kindergarten, among other things.
By Jonathan Martin
(From The Seattle Times, April 5th, 2012)
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jay Inslee proposed an expanded fleet of specialty “innovation schools” and prioritizing early learning in an education plan he rolled out on Thursday
Inslee’s plan was more fiscally restrained than that of his Republican opponent, Rob McKenna, who has proposed a multibillion-dollar, longterm re-orientation of the state budget toward public education.
Inslee, at a news conference at Renton’s Talbot Hill Elementary, emphasized that his plan was “realistic based on today’s economic conditions.”
Should tax revenues rebound, Inslee said, money should first go to reduce class sizes for kindergarten through third grade. He also proposed competitive grants to seed niche programs aimed at everything from art to aviation.
“The status quo is not good enough,” said Inslee. “Too many of our kids don’t make it to the starting line in the race to a middle-class job.”
On hot-button education topics, Inslee, who has been closely aligned with the state teachers union, endorsed a new teacher-evaluation system approved by lawmakers this year that “should end the practice of passing low-performing teachers from school to school.”
The system, which adds student-performance data to a list of factors that principals use to evaluate teachers, was opposed by the Washington Education Association (WEA), the state’s largest teachers union.
Inslee, the son of a high-school teacher, also said he doesn’t support charter schools, which the union also opposes.