Dyslexia advocates, parents, teachers and education officials have proposed wide-ranging legislation to improve reading skills in Wyoming’s public schools.
On Thursday, lawmakers on the state’s Joint Education Committee endorsed the bill with a 9-4 vote, advancing it to the legislative budget session in February.
Sen. Chris Rothfuss (D-Laramie) worked with the group behind the bill.
“I honestly think this bill is exceptional at this point in time,” he told his fellow committee members. “This was a group of highly educated, highly focused individuals that all came together to present their interests, and those interests are reflected in this document.”
The legislation would require screening every public school student under the third grade for dyslexia and screening older students for reading difficulties more generally. It would require all teachers to be trained in literacy education “appropriate to their instructional role and grade band.”
And it would further require evidence-based strategies that conform to the science of reading, a term that will be defined and updated by the state superintendent of public instruction. Nationwide that term generally means putting academic research on the topic into practice in classrooms.
The current superintendent, Megan Degenfelder, announced a major literacy education push last month, of which this legislation is one component.
At the outset of the committee’s meeting last week, Degenfelder touted the work that’s gone into crafting the latest version of the literacy bill.
“I really believe that today we approach this bill with a unified vision around literacy,” she said. “This has been worked by stakeholder groups across the state. This is very exciting and a huge priority, perhaps the largest priority, for me this legislative session.”
During almost five hours of public testimony, the Legislatures’ Education Committee heard from parents, educators and officials about the need for such a bill.
Literacy specialist and former Laramie County teacher Heather Gillam said reading and writing skills are paramount.
“It's the foundation on which all other learning happens,” she said. “Now we just need to ensure that every elementary school teacher is a literacy expert. Every single one.”
Gillam said teachers need the training to take a structured approach to literacy education and should know how to intervene for students who are struggling.
Boyd Brown, executive director of the Wyoming Association of School Administrators, added schools will need more funding to enact the policies prescribed by the bill.
“The districts are going to need some help,” he said. “There's not very many secondary schools that are going to have the resources or the personnel to be able to do what we're asking them to do.”
Rather than tacking the necessary funding onto this bill, Brown suggested it be included in the new school funding model currently being crafted by another legislative committee.
The literacy bill’s next step is surviving introduction in the legislative session this winter. The upcoming session is focused on the state budget, so all other bills need a two-thirds vote to even be introduced.
The Trump Administration unveiled its plan to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education Tuesday, which will involve moving many of the department’s current functions to other federal agencies. Impacts to Wyoming’s schools are unknown at this time.
