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Legislators, DESE consider costs of common core standards testing

Hakan Dahlstrom
/
Flickr

A Missouri House subcommittee is considering whether to approve more money for student assessment tests under the new Common Core State Standards.

The standards are designed to put in place common nationwide achievement goals in math and language arts.  Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Commissioner Chris Nicastro told committee members Tuesday that implementing the Common Core in Missouri has not cost the state any additional money, but that measuring student performance under the new standards will.

"We had to go out last spring for bids for a new testing vendor," Nicastro said.  "The result of that bid came in significantly higher than what we'd been spending previously."

Nicastro said back in September the department requested $30 million in the fiscal year 2015 budget to cover the cost of student assessments, as compared to $12 million in years past. She suggested, though, that the final cost is still an estimate.

"It would probably be more like $26 million roughly," Nicastro said.  "It's doubled…it's more than doubled."

Even though the state board of education adopted the standards in 2010, to be implemented in the 2014-15 school year, they have become controversial. In the legislative session last year, a bill was introduced to to bar the state from putting the standards into place without legislative approval. The billl was changed to require education officials to hold hearings to let people know what they are, how they would change what Missouri students learn and how much they might cost to put into effect. Those hearings were held last May.

State Sen. John Lamping, R-Ladue, has prefiled a bill for this legislative session to prohibit the state from implementing the Common Core standards for public schools.

The 2014 legislative session begins Wednesday at noon.

Dale Singer contributed information for this report.

Follow Marshall Griffin on Twitter:  @MarshallGReport

Copyright 2014 KWMU-FM. To see more, visit http://www.stlpublicradio.org.

Missouri Public Radio State House Reporter Marshall Griffin is a proud alumnus of the University of Mississippi (a.k.a., Ole Miss), and has been in radio for over 20 years, starting out as a deejay. His big break in news came when the first President Bush ordered the invasion of Panama in 1989. Marshall was working the graveyard shift at a rock station, and began ripping news bulletins off the old AP teletype and reading updates between songs. From there on, his radio career turned toward news reporting and anchoring. In 1999, he became the capital bureau chief for Florida's Radio Networks, and in 2003 he became News Director at WFSU-FM/Florida Public Radio. During his time in Tallahassee he covered seven legislative sessions, Governor Jeb Bush's administration, four hurricanes, the Terri Schiavo saga, and the 2000 presidential recount. Before coming to Missouri, he enjoyed a brief stint in the Blue Ridge Mountains, reporting and anchoring for WWNC-AM in Asheville, North Carolina. Marshall lives in Jefferson City with his wife, Julie, their dogs, Max and Mason, and their cat, Honey.
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