Senate committee advances education omnibus bill with changes to Read Act, cell‑phone rules and licensure

The Minnesota Senate Education Policy Committee on April 2 recommended that Senate File 1740, the committee's education omnibus policy bill, be passed and sent to general orders after adopting a series of member amendments.

Senator Sarah Swazinski, chair of the committee, steered consideration of the A2 "delete all" amendment that served as the committee omnibus vehicle and presided as members offered and voted on a sequence of amendments to alter the bill's language.

The package adopted in committee includes multiple, substantive changes across K-12 education policy. Staff and authors walked members through the omnibus amendment and the committee adopted or accepted the following notable elements: - Read Act and literacy/licensure changes: The A25 amendment contains a broad set of Read Act-related changes. The amendment clarifies screening language, allows districts to use partner-language screeners in dual-language immersion programs, changes some references from "grade-level proficiency" to "grade-level benchmarks," and establishes expectations for structured-literacy training for new and nontraditional-pathway teachers. The amendment sets a training/waiver expectation for certain new teachers beginning 07/01/2027 and establishes timelines for tiered licensure candidates (tier 1 and tier 2) to register for, be in progress on, or complete evidence-based structured literacy training as a condition for license renewal or advancement. Committee staff described this portion as aligning training expectations across incoming and currently licensed teachers. - Dual-language…