WV Press Legislative Lookahead Coverage
By David Beard, The Dominion Post
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Legislative leaders aim to put 1,800 new teaching assistants into first- and second-grade classrooms in the next few years. Leaders also are working with the Higher Education Policy Commission to develop a more stable funding formula for the state’s institutions.
Both items were topics of discussion Friday during a session of the West Virginia Press Association’s Legislative Lookahead for the 2022 session that starts Jan. 12.
Delegate Joe Statler, R-Monongalia, is the new vice chair of the House Education Committee and explained both proposals.
The idea behind putting teaching assistants in the classrooms – in the same way pre-K classes already have them – is to improve the student-adult ratio and give the children more individual attention. The bill to be introduced will require any class with more than 12 students to have an assistant.
“On the whole I believe this legislation will be tremendously productive,” he said. The estimated cost to put assistants into 1,800 classrooms will be about $68 million. …
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