Conference Committee Advances ESEA Reauthorization

On Thursday, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) reauthorization process advanced a step as members of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce and the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions reached agreement on a conference report. This report represents a compromise between the House-passed Student Success Act (H.R. 5) and the Senate-passed Every Child Achieves Act of 2015 (S. 1177).

Chaired by Representative John Kline (R-MN), the conference committee spent several days considering amendments to the bipartisan framework crafted by the leadership of both committees in the House and Senate. A summary of the approved framework can be found here. The committee announced that the conference report would be available November 30 to be considered by the House and Senate. The House intends to take up the conference report that week, and the Senate aims to take up the conference report as early as December 7.

If both bodies pass the conference report, it will be sent to President Obama for his signature (or his veto). Earlier this week the administration left room for a veto, but as of this writing, neither the White House nor Secretary Duncan had released a public statement on the ESEA conference completion.


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Deborah Koolbeck

Senior Director of Government Relations, AACTE