Hearings are underway to examine changes to how the Vermont Agency of Education approves independent schools. The Agency of Education says the revised rules are intended to provide clarity for operations and if applicable for receiving public funds.
The hearings are being held by the State Board of Education’s Rule Series 2200 Committee.
Chair of the Board and committee Jennifer Samuelson explained that the proposed changes include three areas of substantive changes.
“First, we've updated the rules to apply the principles and goals of Act One of 2019 to independent schools," noted Samuelson. "The second category is that we are creating a requirement that all independent schools, as a condition of their approval, must annually attest to their compliance to the rules. And third, we have introduced a framework work that accrediting agencies must follow in order to be recognized by the state board of education. So those are the substantive changes. We've also done some reorganization and added in some other things just in the interest of clarity and to make the rules more user friendly.”
Samuelson then noted that the hearing is not a dialogue and the intent is to receive input on the rules.
The Lyndon Institute is an independent high school in the state’s Northeast Kingdom. Head of School Brian Bloomfield expressed support for a number of the changes, but does have some concerns.
“It represents a really good compromise of different perspectives and I think really holds the interests of students at the forefront of it," said Bloomfield. "I also specifically want to call out the ethnic and social equity study, the recommendations from Act 1 being applied to independent schools. I think that's incredibly important. I want to voice my opposition to kind of the unilateral application of EQS to all independent schools. There's a lot of good stuff in there. But they were designed for a public school model and not all independent schools are the same and they're certainly different models than public schools.”
St. Johnsbury Academy Director of Special Services Dr. Mathew Forest was also concerned about the changes to EQS, or Education Quality Standards, particularly regarding teacher certification.
“We really benefit from the flexibility around hiring teachers even if they're not certified educators," Forest said. "We hire some teachers who have a lot of experience in the field, bringing that to the classroom. And I think that really enhances the experience and it also opens up the pool of candidates that we have to choose from. So I've seen that as a significant benefit.”
Northeast Kingdom resident Rod Ames served on the local school board until the school closed due to lack of students. He supports Christian schools and is concerned that the new rules discriminate against them.
“We're X-ing out the opportunity for choice to go to religious schools and Christian schools with some of the regulations that the Act puts forth and would like to see more consideration given for religious schools and Christian schools," said Ames. "As I have observed the education going on with the lack of resources and our student population dropping and people being able to make a choice about where they want their children to go to school, that's where I'm coming from.”
Another hearing is scheduled Monday at 6:30.
