Kentucky.

Tonight I'm Renee Shaw, and we thank you so much for joining us this evening.

Education continues to be a primary focus for state lawmakers during this 2026 Kentucky General Assembly session, as lawmakers continue working on a two year spending plan for the state.

What should public education funding look like, and what are the concerns about the first draft released by House Republicans?

Should school based decision making councils established during education reforms back in 1990 be replaced by advisory councils?

Should Jefferson County's school board hand over some of its power to the superintendent?

There are bills dealing with recruitment, teacher and administrator pay, financial transparency and leadership development, and the governor and House and Senate Democrats continue to push for expansion of pre-K.

Last week, we spoke to four key legislative leaders about education.

Well, tonight, the perspective from four education advocates in our Lexington studio.

We're glad to have doctor Robbie Fletcher, commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Education, Maddie Shepherd, president of the Jefferson County Teachers Association.

And Mike Harmon, state outreach director for the Commonwealth Policy Center.

And joining us by video call from Richmond, Virginia.

Richard Innis, education analyst with the Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions.

We, of course, want to hear from you tonight.

You can send your questions and comments by X. Formerly known as Twitter, at Pub Affairs KET.

Send an email to KY Tonight at Keturah or use the web form at Keturah Julie Raque Adams KY tonight.

Or you can simply give us a call at one 800 494 7605.

Well, welcome to all of our guests, both here in the studio and to Mr.

Innis there in Richmond, Virginia.

We're so glad that you can join us by video call.

Thank you all so much.

Well, let's just get started right.

With an overall blanket question.

I'll start with you, Commissioner.

What should public education funding look like in the state?

Are you pleased with where you have left off in the previous budget, and what would you like to see as lawmakers craft this new budget for the upcoming biennium?

>> I think if you look at House Bill 500, there's some changes that need to be made.

First of all, if we look at transportation, one of the things that's missing in that is there's a $40 million reduction in and transportation from fiscal year 25 to fiscal year 24, and that's the baseline for the upcoming year.

If you look at the inflation and the change in busses, I think if you look at a bus in the cost when I first became superintendent, you're looking at a 72 passenger bus, probably around $70,000.

Now that same bus is $161,000.

So and those and those costs continue to rise also to within within the budget.

We really feel like that those school systems that made the made the push for that nickel tax to get that equalization, that language is not in there.

>> So what does that mean for those who are hearing that and they've heard it, perhaps that lexicon for a long time, but they have very limited understanding.

Help us understand.

>> One of the things that that in order to get equalized funding, a district has always been charged with passing what we call an equalization or a nickel tax.

And once you pass that nickel tax, then whatever you come up with locally is matched, if you will not dollar for dollar, depending on what your property values are for a poor district, that would be a larger percentage for a for a more property rich district, that would be less, but still.

Yet in order to get your bonding potential where it needs to be, you have to have that matching fund.

So for a district that went on the promise of, hey, we're going to make sure that we have that those nickel funds, that matching funds, it could be the difference between a school versus just a renovation project.

As a matter of fact, now, other things that we're always advocate for is an increase in base SEEK.

We feel like that's needed, especially with the cost of inflation.

We really believe that our teachers need to be paid more.

We think that especially if you look in Tennessee with our Tennessee next year, there will be a $50,000 beginning salary for teachers in the state of Tennessee.

That's going to be very difficult to recruit teachers, especially on the border.

>> What's the average in Kentucky for average?

>> I think the average starting is probably in the low 40s, probably around 4344.

I don't have that number in front of me.

Miss Shepherd may have that, I know, but I think it's in the in the low 40s, I would say some districts as low as 38,000 and others may be more depending on where you are in the state.

But again, to advocate for that, those funds but and also to making sure that our students have the materials that they need.

So baseline SEEK funding also when it comes to transportation, which is a part of that SEEK funding and also that equal equalization, nickel equalization.

>> Well, we know that Protect our Schools advocacy group has said, and I think there's even a call right now happening during the show, which we encourage them to kind of hold off for another 50 minutes or so that they are meeting about what they consider to be an all out assault on public education in Kentucky that is embodied in House Bill 500, which is the House Republican budget plan.

Do you see it that way?

And what are the flaws in that document as it currently stands right now?

>> Absolutely.

First, thanks for having me here, Renee.

I would first start to answer the question by reiterating everything Commissioner said about HB 500.

We need investments in public schools rather than continued disinvestment in public schools.

I would just repeat that we need continued investment in the base SEEK fund to adjust for inflation.

The cost to operate a school has continued to increase over the past 5 to 10 years.

The cost to buy a bus, which every school needs.

The cost to buy a Chromebook, which every school needs, the cost to pay a teacher a competitive rate so we can recruit and retain the best teachers to put in front of Kentucky's kids.

Like those costs have continued to rise, and if we don't increase and invest the SEEK funds, we won't be able to educate Kentucky's kids and compete at those levels.

I'd also agree that we need to fully fund transportation, and legislators need to come through on that promise.

But the question that you asked pertains to the provisions in the bill that put limits in place to what a school district can fund in terms of our insurance.

This will not only decimate the insurance.

What what a school employee, not only teachers, but bus drivers are able to pay on their paychecks.

But state employees across all of Kentucky, we're talking corrections officers, social workers, state troopers.

So this is, of course, an assault on public education workers.

But it's also an assault on people that are public servants across the state.

So we need that taken out of of the bill as well.

>> And just to kind of illuminate more of what you're saying, as House Bill 500 now stands, which even the the budget chairman, Jason Petrie, says this is a first draft.

It places a 5% cap on employer health plan contributions per year for members who were in these these public systems.

So we'll see where that goes.

Mr.

Harmon, how do you see it?

Are you as displeased with this first draft of House Bill 500 as your other fellow seatmates here tonight?

>> I was 13 years in the House, and what I always knew was the whether it was the governor's budget or whether it was the House budget or whether it was the Senate budget, those were always the beginning place.

Those will not be the ending place.

Now, you know, as concerned.

Certainly we do need to look for an increase a little bit in SEEK.

I mean, if you look, since the Republicans have been there, there's always been some sort of increase.

We can debate whether it's sufficient or not, but there has been increases with the Republicans came in, they were the first group to actually come in and fully fund the pension arcs for the teachers to make sure that they were taken care of in that regard.

The other thing that I would say is that we should look at other ways for funding, in addition to the general fund budget, for instance, you know, in the quote unquote, one big beautiful bill, there were some educational choice options there if we opt in and some people are saying, well, we shouldn't opt into that, but in reality we should, because that allows individuals to give up to $1,700 to a nonprofit.

And some of that, yes, will be used for private schools, but it can also be used for public education.

>> So a school voucher system or.

>> School voucher.

>> System, scholarship tax credits.

>> You know, there's a big push for universal pre-K.

We wouldn't do universal pre-K.

But if you're pre-K had tuition, you know, maybe not for everybody, but, you know, tuition, you could use some of those if it was set up properly to be used for public schools as well as well as after school programs.

And yes, some of the money will go to private school, but that's okay.

It's coming out of federal dollars.

It's not coming out of state dollars.

>> Voters have said they don't really want to go that route.

Right.

>> This is a this is a federal program.

And the difference is when I was in the House, there was a big push for us to adopt expanded gaming.

And it was always said, well, it'll help the kids and we know it.

You know, it hurts Kentucky more than it would help the kids.

But part of the argument was, well, the money will go outside of the state.

Well, the way this bill, this federal bill is written, if Kentucky doesn't opt in, that doesn't stop somebody from taking $1,700 and giving it to an out-of-state one that actually did opt into it.

So it's important for us to make sure that every dollar that is available, we can make sure not just for public education, but education in general.

>> Have you been talking to some of your former Republican colleagues about putting forth such an idea, putting it in bill form?

>> Well, actually, there is a bill form House Bill 88.

TJ Roberts has a bill.

I don't know whether it will move or not move, but it is one of the things that we should look at as additional options when there is so few educational dollars out there, any additional educational dollar that we can get, you know, whether it's public or private, we know that some of that will make it into the public if it's set up correctly.

>> Richard Innes, how do you see things, sir?

>> Well, first of all, I'm glad that we've heard about House Bill 88.

So it's when we're looking at and all the comments that Mr.

Harmon made are absolutely on target.

Kentucky is basically going to be giving away money to other states if they don't jump in on this, because you can take your $1,700 and send it up to Ohio or another state that's opted into the program.

As far as the overall budgeting concerns go, our expert on financing, Professor John Herron from the University of Kentucky, issued a report about two years ago called K-12 in Kentucky A Summary of Facts and Trends, and it's available online at Blue Grass Institute.

And a couple of things he found in here are not what people are commonly hearing.

Overall, the funding increase in real dollars from.

2013 to 2022 was 24%.

And after adjusting for inflation from 1990 to 2022, we've seen a 122% increase in total funding.

Now, where that money is all going is certainly not going to the teachers.

Average teacher salaries after inflation.

Professor Garin found rose very little, only about 1.8 times higher than they were back in 1990.

But the per pupil funding overall was 20 or 2.22 times higher.

So we're getting a lot more money in the system now than we did back when Kerr started.

But where is it going?

And Professor Garin can answer some of those questions with his report.

So we have concerns not so much about is the total amount that we're spending on education inadequate, but are we spending it in the right places and how do we adjust that?

>> Well, let me ask Commissioner Fletcher, are those dollars and those increases?

Is it going to help with student outcomes?

Has it been helping with student outcomes?

What's the evidence that more money over this period of time that John Guerin has studied is actually paying off?

>> Well, I will say, first of all, that Mr.

Harmon would point out something.

He's very he's absolutely correct.

We are at as far as record highs, as far as numbers that we're getting per pupil now.

But if you look at when we talk about where's the money going, if you look at our state test scores in Nape, and also if you look at our our actual state accountability scores, we increase in almost in every area and, and across the board.

And then in writing, I think we stayed a little flat, but everything else was an increase.

And we're at the highest levels that we have for state testing at this point as we've been nape also, again, some of the highest scores actually since Covid, we've had some of the highest scores we've had since Covid.

It's gone into that also, but also to let's reiterate, if you look at just within the past 12 years, the cost of a bus going from 70 some thousand dollars to $160,000, I can tell you that money is going in places where, for example, for that inflationary cost.

Now, I will say many districts will will point and make it a point to, okay, you have to make a decision.

When inflation goes up that much, are you going to put it to teacher salary?

Are you going to put it to materials for students?

Are you going to put it to a transportation or are you going to put it to safety?

But again, we're very thankful, very thankful for the investments that our legislators have.

And it has increased.

And we would, but we're lobbying for an additional increase to meet with that inflation.

>> What's the additional increase you're lobbying for?

>> Well, we'd love to see.

And we'd always lobby up to around 5000 per student, you know.

But again.

>> It's now at what, 4248 48.

>> I'm sorry, $44,586 per student.

Now, of course, that depends on your district.

You know, every single district is going to be different based on the add ins, whether it be from home hospital, whether it be from Ell populations, whether it be from high poverty areas.

So, you know, the add ins and then the local effort.

And then if you look at that, how it all goes together, not one single district gets the same amount of money per student, but that's the base amount that you work from.

So again, I do want to applaud that the that our legislator has increased, they have increased that base pupil amount.

But again we need it to increase to make sure that we can afford the busses and things of that nature.

Our test scores are improving and we're thankful for that.

Well, I want to thank our teachers for the hard work, the students for their hard work.

But again, we are seeing those improvements across the board.

>> Mr.

Ennis.

>> I have to disagree about the test scores.

Part of the problem was that some slides that KDE developed for the state board in December were not created properly.

They failed to take account of the statistical sampling errors that are present in all the data, and which sometimes mean that a small increase in scores is not statistically significant.

And so Nate cannot confirm for us that small changes absolutely did occur.

In fact, the slides the board saw in December, if they had been properly annotated, would have made it clear that only Nate fourth grade math showed a statistically significant increase in scores from 2022 to 2024.

Now, the Act, the longest running program that we have, that's giving us a trend line on Kentucky education tells a very, very different story.

We started testing 11th graders with the Act back in 2008, and up through 2017, we were seeing nice increases in the Act composite score.

However, after 2017, the Act composite score has been on the skids and that started before Covid.

And by the way, if you look at the Nape scores, allowing for that statistical sampling problem, the nape scores are lower recently by a statistically significant amount than they were back around 2015 2017, the same time that the act started on the skids.

Our latest Act score is only for composite is only 18.1.

That is lower than the score we got way back in 2008.

So we have some problems now.

We did show progress on the Kentucky, Summit and assessments, but in most cases it was small and the Nape could not confirm that progress for elementary or middle schools in most cases.

And I have got a report out about this slides or issued in December that anybody can access.

Again at Blue Grass Institute.

Org, it's called evaluating Kentucky's assessment results data emissions and governance.

And this talks about the slides that were used in December.

I'm working on a follow on that.

We'll talk about the additional problems that showed up with slides that the board saw in their 4th February 2026 meeting, but the Act looking at high schools absolutely does not confirm rises in Kentucky Summit assessment scores.

>> So I want to bring in the commissioner to to answer that.

He takes issue with some of those progress reports.

What say you?

>> Well, when it comes to you can't compare the act with Kentucky Summit of test Kentucky summative test is content mastery, whereas an act is what is the progress towards your adaptive, your aptitude towards college readiness.

So now I will say that we've had some ups and downs in the Act.

But now as far as last year, I think we had a 0.1 decrease.

If you want to talk about distinct decrease, the statistical significance.

But now again, I can say we didn't slide.

If you look at the the statistical the statistical significance of the math increase, we're very happy about that.

But if you look at it as compared to other states, we are increasing when we're compared to other states as we move forward.

So again, you can't really compare an Act score with the Kentucky summative assessment because the summative assessment is about content mastery, whereas the act is college readiness.

Now would we want higher scores?

Absolutely.

I will agree with Mr.

Ennis that we want higher scores for our kids.

We have that progress.

But if you look at all the slides, including the I think we had a slide deck of well over 100 slides for the one in February.

You're more welcome to look through all of those.

But again, as straight analysis, I don't see any statistical statistical issues that we can see.

>> That I want to come back to you real quickly before we move on to other topics to talk about the difference between content mastery versus college aptitude.

There is a difference there and a distinction.

>> There is a difference.

The key is, is the Kentucky summative assessment.

Cut score.

Set points where it needs to be.

And an answer to that comes out of a report that Act Incorporated did back in 2006.

The question they were asking then is when we all asked.

And that is what skills do kids who are not going on to college but want to get into living wage careers, generally apprenticeship type programs?

What skills do they now need in order to succeed in those non-college TRACK living Wage Careers Act very firmly found after talking to business and industry, that business and industry said we need the same skills.

Basically the college entrance need.

So the idea that there's somehow a difference between Casey and Act, I fully agree.

The problem is the KSA is measuring something that doesn't relate to what our kids need anymore, and we need to fix that.

>> All right.

Thank you for that.

We do want to pivot to another perspective.

And that's the school governance issues.

And there have been several bills, several meaning a few that have already been filed and discussed and acted on and advanced already in this lawmaking session of the Kentucky General Assembly.

And I want to start with the site based or school based decision making councils.

And the question came and it was answered in a committee last week.

Senator Aaron Reed has a bill, Senate Bill 152, that would actually transfer the decision making power that was once closest to students, parents and teachers by the SB, DMs, from the SB, DMs to advisory councils.

And I want to ask you, Commissioner Fletcher, what are your thoughts about that?

And for those who wonder, well, what did those site based decision making councils do, were they effective and did it actually advance student achievement?

What would you say to that?

And if changing it, would it make a difference?

>> I'd like to see the research behind what what would be the cause to move from the school based decision making model to a advisory council model?

I think if you look at the success we've had with our local economy, I think the decisions need to be made locally.

So when you have that school based decision making model, the people that are making the decisions are the ones that are closest to the students.

So when you have that model, I think that's where we need to stay.

Now, I do think that Senator Reed, I think he's got he's put some thought and effort into this.

I respect his decision.

But just so happened, I believe that it's best to have a school based decision making council to make that policy for that local school.

Now, there has been changes over the years.

For example, a principal, when a principal selects a teacher, that's through consultation.

So the principal already has final decision on who's hired as a teacher.

Also too, there's been changes as far as how the principal selected before the superintendent was just one vote.

Now the superintendent actually has it's basically a consultation model where the council will come together and make consultation, and then the superintendent selects who is that next principal.

So there's been some changes over the year.

But overall with that local policy in my opinion, are best made with those people that are at the school on the ground, boots on the ground, next to the kids.

>> I want to ask miss Shepherd, what do you think about this measure?

>> I would agree with Commissioner Fletcher's position that the decision making needs to lie with those closest to students.

Sbmm is often made up of the principal, parents and teachers that work directly in the school.

But the real issue here is that we we continue to try, you know, small solutions to try and get better student outcomes when the reality is we need more funding.

We're not going to get better student outcomes like the ones that Mr.

Ennis or Commissioner Fletcher or, you know, all of the teachers in Kentucky are seeking without investment in public schools.

A recent Change Research poll found that 70% of Kentuckians want more investment in public schools.

We're not going to get a teacher in every classroom, a bus driver on every bus and the best, most highly trained teachers in every classroom.

If we don't have competitive wages, we're not going to bet or get the the highest quality technology in every class.

We're not going to get the environments and experiences that will prepare our kids to compete on the global stage.

If we're not going to talk about the real solutions, and that is investment in public schools.

>> And also, does that translate to meaning more investment in public educators themselves?

What should pay look like for Kentucky educators?

>> Well, right now and Commissioner Fletcher alluded to this earlier.

According to a National Education Association survey of average educator pay across all 50 states, Kentucky ranks in some of the lowest.

We're in the low 40s.

When you look at average educator pay across the state.

And so for us to be able to pull in educators from not only Kentucky but across the country, we have to be able to compete with states across the country.

And so raising that educator pay so that we are able to recruit and retain not only within the education profession, but across all professions, is something that we have to do to be able to put the best teachers in front of Kentucky students.

>> Mr.

Harmon, I want to go back to the school based decision making councils.

You've you've been around or you were around a long time in the legislature and you're very familiar with this.

>> And during my time there, it was just as commissioner said, there was always that struggle.

Of course, the site based councils came around right before I got there, and there's been a struggle ever since.

I know when I was in there, there was look, just you said to have the more power with the superintendent and then some of it with the principals.

And from that standpoint, we have seen a lot.

Now, Aaron Reed's bill, specifically, Senator Reid's bill specifically, there was a Senate committee substitute which blunted a little bit of the concerns, if I remember correctly.

But no, we're we're ever changing.

And I always believe that.

I agree that it does need to be the closest to you.

But I also agree that we need to make sure that we have avenues of accountability.

And of course, your closest accountability is your school board and your school board, because they are elected by the general public to make sure that they they have they're now the site base council themselves.

Like I said, we've seen multiple changes and some of the original concerns, especially for the superintendent.

I think sometimes the superintendent had some concerns about having his hand ties and all.

We always kind of related to like being the head coach.

If you hired a head coach of, you know, UK, you wouldn't bring him in there and not let him pick the assistant coach.

And that's kind of what we felt like when I was back.

>> So you favor Senate Bill 152, Senator Reid's bill.

>> The way with it, the way that it has been changed.

Yes, I would be in.

>> Favor of it.

I want to go to Mr.

Innis to get his perspective on this.

>> Yes, actually, I did a report on school based decision making back in 2018.

And again, school based decision making policy.

A closer look is up on the Blue Grass Institute.

Org website.

And talking about the research that Commissioner Fletcher said he wishes was there, we agree with him because we found out that research on the effectiveness of the school based model all but stopped years ago.

There hasn't been any recently other than my report, but we found some things in that report that were pretty disturbing.

Basically a very strong indication that parents aren't really interested in school based councils based on the percentage of parents that vote in the school based council elections for the parent representatives.

And I ran the recent figures from data that's up in the department's website a day or so ago.

And in 2025, Commissioner, there were four 44,786 votes cast by parents for school based council members.

However, the end of year student membership for that year was over 630,946 students.

So those votes only account for about 7.1% of the students.

Now, that's not going to be an exact 1 to 1 relationship, but very clearly, the parent interest compared to the number of kids in school is pretty doggone small.

And the reason for that is by law school based councils have always been under the control of the teachers.

The the percentage of parents on a school based council, by law, is always going to be less than 50%.

Parents don't have any control with school based councils and based on the way they vote, I think they know it.

So yes, it's time for a change.

And we did a part change when we said we want to get the curriculum in the hands of the superintendent, where better expertise of the district wide level can choose a curriculum so that you will have consistent education in every school in that district, at least.

And we need to go further with that based on these latest voting figures that tell me that parents still are just disinterested.

>> Commissioner Fletcher, I'll give you a chance to respond.

>> I think that when you talk to parents, it depends on the district.

And I think that one of the things that we hear from our legislators, we want more and more parent involvement, that's a big push, is how can we have more and more parent involvement.

So if if we really minimize, if you will, the the authority of the site based council, then I think that we're taking more, more away from that parent involvement.

So we believe and I think our legislators, I think people across the Commonwealth believe we need more and more parent involvement.

I don't think that this step with school based decision making is that step to to increase parent engagement.

>> So.

So would you have more parents or more than 50% of parents on the site based council?

>> I wouldn't have an issue with it being 50 over 50.

Yeah, not at all.

Personally, I now because I've worked with a lot of great parents.

So, you know, as far as the 32I do, I do like the fact that the, the, the teachers in the, in that building has the ability to make the decisions because they have maybe a little more background, but I would have no issue with it being 50 over 50, to be honest.

But with that being said, with under what is now, I don't see a reason to move away from where we are now, just like Mr.

Innes said, the research just isn't there to to promote this change.

>> So another governor's issue, Senate Bill one, which is the top priority of the Senate, this is Senate President pro tem David Givens bill that would transfer power from the elected board of Jefferson County Public Schools to the district's superintendent.

When it comes to day to day operations and other things, miss Shepherd, even the superintendent, Doctor Brian Yearwood, when he testified, said he doesn't need this authority, doesn't want this authority, and doesn't think it would be a good idea.

What say you?

You were vocal about that particular measure, as I recall.

>> Well, much like the bill that that we just talked about with SB 152, Senate Bill one is another bill that follows the pattern of taking away local control and centralizing it.

This bill would limit how often the board can meet.

It would narrow the school board's authority require a supermajority to overrule a decision of the superintendent, and all of these things together reduce the role of the democratically elected school board.

It reduces the school board into symbolic oversight rather than the real representation that Kentuckians deserve in their democratically elected officials.

It concentrates authority.

It reduces transparency.

And right now, the bill is targeted at Jefferson County.

But the the criteria is such that this could be another district some other time.

And it it limits every community's right to self-governance.

And we all need to be really sensitive to this pattern of removing a community's ability, the people's ability, Kentuckians ability to govern themselves, and the continued pattern to concentrate power with one person.

>> Well, to your point about perhaps this sets a template for other school districts down the road.

Senate President Pro Tem David Givens did say that this really is concerning Jefferson County, because Jefferson County faces unique challenges and needs a different kind of governance structure than other districts.

Commissioner Fletcher, are you concerned that this would gain steam and would not just be relegated to Jefferson County, but then could be replicated elsewhere?

>> I'm never in favor of having a legislation towards one one particular district.

I think that, again, I would love for us to look at if we need to make changes, let's make changes across the Commonwealth.

But with that being said, if you look at, I think that I will give Senator Gibbons some credit.

He took a lot of time in trying to talk about the complexity and the needs of Jefferson County as compared to other, other districts.

You know, the first eight pages talks about the differences between the first 11.

But on the other hand, to look at the changes in the tough decisions that Doctor Yearwood and the the school board has already started making, they've started making some tough decisions, working together to move forward.

So again, when when the man himself, Mr.

Doctor Yearwood, says, I don't need this authority, it would be hard for me to say, okay, let's give him that authority because they are working together as it is to move forward.

So and again, I would not want to see this to to make a head of steam to move forward either.

>> How do you see it, Mr.

Harmon?

>> Well, I mean, from the standpoint, I'm not as familiar with Senate Bill one as I need to be.

But from what I have seen and what I have read, I do have concern about creating a bill that that basically targets one school district, you know, but some of the things down in there may be very, very helpful.

But I also would like to keep as much power in the school boards as possible, both for picking a superintendent and.

But you can also argue the other side that once a superintendent is picked, you know, they should have a little more free rein to be able to develop.

But if the superintendent himself doesn't want it, then, you know.

>> If I may, if I.

>> Yes, yes.

>> One of the things that in order to make real change in a district, you have to have transparency and trust.

Again, I think by keeping it as is, we're protecting Doctor Yearwood, really.

And the reason for that is if if one person are making these huge decisions, then there's less trust.

If there's more people that's making the decision, that's working together, then you're able to make real change.

That's when we are able when we have that trust, transparency, transparency and of course, collaboration as we move forward.

So thank you for letting me add that.

>> I think a school district operates best, like our government, when there's a three legged stool and each of the three legs holds up the school district, you have the superintendent, the school board and the community that has an investment in the overall well-being and the success of the public school.

If any one of those legs becomes, you know, has too much authority, then the stool is not balanced.

And so allowing all three of those to have the ability to work together and have a trusting relationship is the best way to have a successful, collaborative, transparent school district.

And this bill would create the conditions for that stool to become unbalanced.

>> And one of the other provisions of SB one, as we discussed last week, was legislative leaders, is is it allows the superintendent to have $250,000 of, I would just say, a petty cash fund without having to get board approval.

What is the wisdom in that, particularly when this district faces a hefty over $150 million budget deficit at this time?

Do you understand that?

>> I would again, the more people that can be a part of that decision, the better.

You know, I wouldn't want that decision.

I I'm a former superintendent.

I would not want that that much authority as a superintendent to make that type of decision.

I would want the input from the board and also others in that room to say, okay, we want to make sure that we're making the best decision for kids.

>> Yeah.

Mr.

Ennis, I'll give you a chance to kind of weigh in on this topic before we move on.

>> I think we're the most interesting things about this bill, which was already mentioned, is the fact that the massive number of problems in Jefferson County are outlined in the first eight pages.

I don't recall seeing another bill ever go into that much justification for what then follows with the proposed changes.

The Jefferson County problem is very severe.

It's been going on ever since Kira began.

We're not coming up with answers.

Maybe this is something we need to try as a new approach.

And I think what Senator Givens is trying to say to the Kentucky Supreme Court, who undoubtedly will get a chance to look at this if it goes through, is we have so many problems, you can't limit us from trying something different, whether this is the right answer or not, that remains to be seen.

>> And I think Senator Givens would say the reason why he made that justification is because of what the Supreme Court did.

Right?

To kind of help keep it constitutional.

>> So to your point, Renee, this is actually not any different from a previous bill that was enacted.

And many of the things that are listed in this version were born out of the things that happened in JCPS while the previous version was implemented.

I mean, the a lot of the financial woes that JCPS is experiencing and the transportation crisis that happened several years ago happened while the previous version was implemented.

So we tried this solution.

It didn't prevent many of the issues that then manifested.

So we should try different solutions.

And fully funding public schools is one we haven't yet tried, and that one might be one for us to explore.

>> And on that point about this governance and the power of school boards, etc.

should school boards in Jefferson and Fayette County, this is a different bill.

Senate Bill 114 be appointed rather than elected.

>> I'll start with that.

>> You'll start.

>> With that again.

Local authority.

You know, in order to have transparency, in order to have trust, in order to have a positive outcomes, you have to have everyone working together, in my opinion.

So if you look at someone appointing the school board, whether it be Jefferson Fayette or Lawrence County, Graves County or others, you're taking that control out of the local vote, the local voter.

So again, they need to have that authority to say, these are the people that we want on our school boards.

These are the people that we want to be there.

Again, I think that Senator Gibbons, I give he's a friend of mine.

I think that he's put a lot of work into this.

But on the other hand, too, I really believe that in order to have a true change in culture, you have to have that buy in from the local local community, the local voter.

>> Okay.

Any other comment on that, Mr.

Ennis, do you care to make one more comment before I ask Mr.

Harmon for his.

>> I'm not so sure that pulling authority away from the local boards is the way to go.

I think what the legislature needs to look at is increasing the accountability for boards that are not performing.

We should certainly have elected boards, there's no question about that.

But what happens when they don't perform?

What happens when we have a situation in Jefferson County?

We don't have a good system right now where the state Board of Education or the legislature or whatever can take a look at a system that's clearly got major problems and say, we need to replace this board because it's dysfunctional.

I think that's where we really need to go.

>> All right.

>> I truly believe we should still have an elected school board.

If there's concerns about whether the school board is capable of doing it.

I know there's a bill, Senate Bill 71, that passed an increase.

It's not huge amount, but it creates some additional education for school board members, which if you're going to be in education, it's always good to be continually educated on how to to do the job that you've been elected to do.

But it definitely should be elected.

>> Because we're going to take a break from that stuff.

To go to a question from Jeff Sims in Caldwell County about AI, he says ChatGPT use among school age children, particularly teenagers, has seen rapid growth, with approximately 26% of U.S.

teens aged 13 to 17 reporting they've used the tool for schoolwork as of early as of 2025, according to the Pew Research Center.

He says as AI use continues to rise, will physical school attendance continue to decline in the Commonwealth as the option of homeschooling or other paths expands?

Interesting question.

>> Very interesting question.

And I'll start with that one.

If one of the things that we've actually brought forward with with Senator Givens, we talked we met with him last week to talk about, you know, a network.

How do we take our digital learning coaches that we have in place and then also include AI specialists, AI teacher specialists that can say, you know, how are teachers using AI to make their jobs easier?

But more importantly, how are they also allowing students to use AI to produce content, whether it be written or video, but also to how are they using AI in industry and the career fields, but also how to program the computer science aspect of actually programing AI.

So I think that if we look at we need to strengthen our network and have some funding there as it relates to AI and how we're using that in the classroom and making sure our students have the opportunity.

Because I tell teachers all the time, I'll never believe that a teacher can be replaced by AI, but you can be replaced by a teacher that is using AI.

Yeah, definitely.

>> Right.

That's that's a good point.

Well, the AI task force that has been in play for a little while, Senator Amanda Mays Bledsoe and Josh Bray, they've been working on this.

Do you anticipate legislation to be filed when it comes to AI use in the classroom?

>> I think there's a possibility.

I think we're still trying to figure out what's happening with at the federal government or what we're allowed to do and what we can't do.

But with that being said, I do.

I would expect that hopefully we can get some allocation there to directed towards AI and education, and that's something that we'd like to see moving forward.

>> What are the concerns you're hearing about from parents, teachers, students about AI in the classroom?

>> I mean, of of course, they're broad concerns about the use of AI in the classroom and how it might be used for good or evil, and replacing educators, of course.

But on the attendance question, I, I did want to use that question to talk about HB 257, which is the proposal to improve and modernize our assessment and accountability system and put an emphasis on the types of learning experiences that bring kids to school.

One of the terms that is that you'll see a lot in that bill.

And in the United We Learn work is vibrant learning experiences.

Kids come to school if they're experiencing learning and environments where they feel capable, where they're experiencing social networks, a sense of belonging, and where they're becoming better versions of themselves, and an emphasis on vibrant learning experiences where they're learning to go out into the real world.

They're setting goals about what their life might be like after school.

They're getting to collaborate with students and work with community partners.

All of these sorts of things are becoming an even bigger emphasis than they already are in Kentucky, and it's those types of learning experiences that are going to draw kids into school and increase attendance, whether AI is a part of that or not, I'm sure it will be.

I'm sure teachers will use AI as assistants to magnify and multiply what a teacher or what a student is able to do, but I think the real answer about attendance is are kids engaged?

Do they want to be there?

Do they feel like they're part of a community?

And as long as we are able to create experiences where the answer to that question is yes, then they will come to school.

We will have attendance.

I don't think it will have as much to do with AI.

>> Commissioner.

>> Again, thank you so much for bringing up House Bill 257 and as a matter of fact, I think Mr.

Ennis also gave us a good segue earlier.

Our kids are so much more than a test score.

Now, granted, our our test scores are higher than they've been since Covid.

Let's let's be very clear about that again.

Mr.

Anderson, I may disagree about some statistical analysis, but they are the highest they've been since Covid.

Now, with that being said, we're looking for two parts in House Bill 257.

And I think it's a phenomenal step forward.

First of all, we still have math, science, social studies and reading as the foundational part for that CSI calculation or for the red, blue, green and yellow rating system.

We still have that in there, but we also are moving from the element of change, comparing two groups from one to another to having an individual student growth.

The most important indicator that for a school, in my opinion, is where did you get the child and where did you take them?

That's why growth has to be a part of it.

And that's just one part.

The other part is the local accountability piece, just like what Mr.

Innis said earlier, our kids need so much more.

They need foundational reading and math skills.

Absolutely.

Without a doubt.

You'll never hear me say otherwise.

But they also need to be communicators, collaborators.

They need to be creative thinkers.

They needed to be global learners.

And that's what this second piece is.

It's about local accountability.

Our kids need those durable skills, just like the data that we're talking about earlier.

They have to have those durable skills.

They have to have grit and persistence to be able to be successful.

That's what 257 takes a step towards.

Yes, we still have the one piece where we're looking at CSI calculation, and we're also looking at color ratings.

And I have some other points about color ratings, but that will come at a later time.

But on the other hand, we also have that local accountability where we want kids to have the vibrant learning opportunities, where they're doing defenses of learning, project based learning, where they're doing defenses of learning, where they're doing passion projects.

You know, I'll give you a good example if you want to look at a a good project based learning, there's so many of those across the state.

And I hate to mention one because there's thousands, but if you go to Madisonville, North Hopkins, they just finished a recently a freight box challenge where they finished a medical office.

They framed the inside of an office in their geometry class, carpentry class, their AG class.

And now that box sits in Liberia, Africa.

You heard me correctly.

That is the only medical office in that community in Liberia, Africa.

And it was built in Madisonville, North Hopkins.

That is a vibrant learning experience.

And there's hundreds of those.

That's the best thing about being commissioners to see that happen.

House Bill 257 is a step towards making sure our kids have more and more vibrant learning.

And just like Mr.

Ennis said earlier, our kids need more skills when it comes to that workplace, and that's what this is about.

>> And on the AI specifically, it's it's interesting.

Of course, I was the guy that years ago said I didn't want a kid to have a calculator until he was in third grade, because you got to build that math.

Chris I was a math guy.

I jokingly always say, I graduate with a triple major in math, statistics, and theater.

That way I knew the math, knew the stats, what I didn't know, I just act like I knew.

So politics, it worked out very well.

But you know, it's important to get those foundational items, the math, the the writing, the, you know, all of it, all of reading, writing, arithmetic that we always talked about.

And for me, the more you use tools, it's important.

We have to learn tools.

We have to get into the modern age, but we also have to build those structures where we're thinking about it and understand why they work beforehand.

And AI is interesting.

You know, I was I was going to write an op ed and I had a certain categories I was going to do, and I did write it separately myself.

But just for the fun of it, I keyed into one of the AI's.

I said, right, this AI under these parameters and put it in the voice of former auditor Mike Harmon, and it spit out one that was a little different than what I had wrote.

But it it could have been something that I could have written.

And I read that to my wife and she said, I thought you wrote that.

So I do understand it's going to be a challenge, but it's going to be a great tool.

But we also have to be careful.

And of course there's some situations, they're putting some parameters.

But in some of the AI's sadly have led kids to take their life.

And so we have to be careful.

It's like with anything it can be used like a brick, it can be used to break a window, or it can be used to build a school.

It's just a tool.

>> Yeah.

Mr.

Ennis, your thoughts on AI?

>> I think the AI question is a very serious one, and I'm glad that House Bill 257 was brought up in relation to it, because there's some issues with that that get into this AI discussion as well.

I read a very interesting paper on Substack just recently called Privileging the Already Privileged, and it discusses how these student centered approaches, the demonstration projects, and all of that actually work to privilege the already privileged.

But they don't work well for kids who aren't privileged, and this has been known for a long time.

You can go back and look at research from an extensive program called Project Follow Through, which actually started in Lyndon Johnson era and was the most heavily funded research project on education ever attempted.

And what they found was when they looked at about ten different programs, most of them based on progressive education theories, but one based on what's called direct instruction.

It was direct instruction that ran away with the best performances of all of these models.

And the reason, in part, was the direct instruction model is the one that helped the minorities and the disadvantaged students the most.

So I have a lot of concerns about House Bill 257, and I'm not sure it's the right time to be doing that bill in the first place.

For one thing, here we go again, changing a accountability system built around what we currently call the Kentucky summative assessments, which only started in 2022.

And we're going to change it again right at the time when we really don't know if we're recovering from Covid, I can promise you and I can show you the data if anyone wants to challenge me that.

If you look at Nape, if you look at Act, we are in much worse shape now than we were back around 2015.

2017 time frame, much worse shape than we were then.

That's not a question.

That's a fact.

And right now, at this time, the department already has changed from using the act, which gives us a 18 year long trend line.

And we're going to start using the SAT.

We're throwing out the longest trend line of performance we have on Kentucky schools.

It makes no sense.

Worse, I'm not sure that the S-a-t was adopted properly.

The Department of Education did it on its own and negotiated the contract.

The state board was never involved, and other agencies that are supposed to be involved with changes to the Assessment Accountability Program, specifically the Office of Education Accountability and the education, Assessment and Accountability Review Subcommittee, were not involved either.

I looked through the subcommittee's minutes going back well before this action took place.

There was no discussion.

I called OCA and got confirmation they had never been involved either.

And so here we go, dropping a very important test with a lot of important trends.

And House Bill 257 is interesting because it has the changes the commissioner wants, but it's interesting in that bill, you will find the wording of the requirements for the college entrance test to be used as part of Kentucky's assessment program.

It says we're going to have English reading, math and science.

Well, I got news for you.

The S.A.T.

doesn't test English as a specific subject, and it doesn't test science as a specific subject either.

I'm told the SAT says, oh, well, we're going to create a SAT grade for you based on what we got out of English and or.

I'm sorry, get out of reading and writing and math.

But I don't see how you do that without biasing those subjects towards science and away from other areas that kids who are good in literature, programs and so forth could do very well with with the reading program, but might not do so well if they have to read a scientific item and then answer it.

>> So I want to I want to bring in the commissioner to talk about that.

Thank you for bringing up the segue to we know that is state law, right?

Did that require the move from the Act to the SAT?

And what was the process by which that contract was entered with the S.A.T.

>> When we went through the process that we had to go through was it's a procurement process.

So state law says we have to have a college admissions irradiance exam.

So what we did was we went through the procurement from the Office of Finance, the cabinet, and then followed to the t the what we were supposed to do.

You did have that SAT came in with a lower bid.

So if you're looking at two different systems, you're looking at approximately $150,000 per year difference.

So there is a it was a procurement then also too, if you look at the the quality, you look at the adaptive test with the SAT was also another part that made this again was a better test.

Now this was the same process that was used to give A.C.T.

act was actually in statute as act.

The American College Test was called that the act was in statute.

You had to use the act.

And then in the 2016 or somewhere in that neighborhood, there was a change in the law to say that you could that had to be a college admissions test.

So that means now you bid it out.

So if you go through that bidding process through Procurement Act one it and then and that contract was finished, we went through the procurement process again.

And now Saturday one.

Now I will say, if you look at what the act again is not a part of KSA, it is one of the transition readiness measures.

You can also get college if you get a college certificate.

I'm sorry, an industry certification.

If you get college readiness scores, which you can also get on the SAT and you get 18, 19, 20.

I think where the benchmarks for Act, then you could be quote unquote transition ready.

It was never a part of KSA proper except well, I'm sorry.

Rewind.

It used to be a part of KSA years ago.

It was the science test.

But the science reasoning does not measure science content.

KSA does.

We have a science KSA exam now.

The SAT does a science analysis score.

So if you look at how the Act does science reasoning, you read passages and you look at data analysis and you make interpretations.

So my question back is how is it any different to read a reading passage that has science content in it to make interpretations about science scores any different than what the science reasoning was?

They're not the exact test.

I'm not trying to say they are, but he is right.

It is an interpretation score.

Science analysis.

They're not.

There's not a specific science section, so it is a shorter test.

With that being said, you know, if if you want to have the same act every year, then it should have just stayed act and statute.

But it didn't.

It changed.

>> And this is saving the department.

How much money.

By going with the.

>> It could save us well over a million, million dollars over, over the next few years of the contract.

If we go the full nine years.

>> We only have just a couple of minutes left.

I'm going to ask if other panelists have a comment about the switch to the SAT.

Does it matter to you?

>> I think I would just reiterate the message that Commissioner Fletcher gave earlier, which is that our kids are more than test scores.

>> Mr.

Harmon.

>> I like a constant baseline, but I also understand, you know, when we're talking about funding and appropriations, you know, if there's a way to save money and you're following procurement laws.

As a former auditor, we like to follow the procurement laws than I do understand.

>> Last question, and this is coming from Tom Miller from Owen County.

And I'm going to have miss Shepherd answer this question.

How does the teachers union influence school board members in Jefferson County and Fayette County?

But you are part of Jefferson County in regards to endorsements?

>> Well, much like any constituent, teachers unions have the ability to pool their resources to endorse a candidate.

>> Any comment about further comment about that, Mr.

Harmon?

>> Well, you know, from the standpoint I do like anything, it's an election cycle and everybody has the opportunity to pick who they want to pick.

You know?

>> Well, it's been a really good discussion.

I thank you all for being here.

Education has been the dominant issue so far in this legislative session.

But we'll talk more about what lawmakers can still do in the remaining days.

And next time on Kentucky tonight, we will talk about the midpoint of the session, which will be a little bit beyond.

When we come to you next Monday night, we'll have legislative leaders to be with us next Monday night to talk about where things stand and where they see it going.

Our coverage of the 2026 Kentucky General Assembly continues every weeknight on Kentucky Edition, which we hope you'll join us for at 630 eastern, 530 central, and, of course, Bill Bryant and a team of working journalists in Kentucky discuss the news of the week on comment on Kentucky Friday at 8:00 eastern, seven central, right here on KET.

Thanks so very much for watching.

I'm Renee Shaw and I'll see you tomorrow night on Kentucky Edition.

Take good care.

It was a very good one, though.

>> It was a good one.

>> So if you're going to do one, I mean, make it big, right?

Go big or go home.

>> Go big or.

>> Go home.

Yes.

Thank you.

Dick, I'm sorry we didn't get to come back to you, but because you can't see the timer, I needed to get out on time.

Or else the next program gets mad at me.

So I'm sorry I