DATE: Wednesday, September 3, 1997          TAG: 9709030464

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B12  EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY BILL BASKERVILL, ASSOCIATED PRESS

DATELINE: RICHMOND                          LENGTH:   42 lines

EDUCATION BOARD REFUSES TO DELAY VOTE ON PUBLIC SCHOOL STANDARDS

The State Board of Education rejected a legislative commission's request to delay its vote Thursday on new public school accreditation standards.

``We've waited long enough on this. . . . The children of Virginia have waited long enough for this,'' Board President Michelle Easton said Tuesday at the conclusion of a two-hour meeting with members of the Commission on the Future of Public Education.

Commission members expressed concern over whether the emphasis on academics gives short shrift to vocational programs, whether new tests will stress memorization instead of application of knowledge, and whether remedial programs are effective and adequately funded.

They had complained last week that they had been left out of the process of writing the new standards, and they just wanted some information from the board controlled by appointees of Republican Gov. George Allen.

```Our people tell us one thing, your people tell us another,'' Del. Linda T. Puller, D-Fairfax, told Easton. ``We would just like to slow down.''

The commission wanted another 30 to 60 days to study the standards.

Easton said the board has spent the past year rewriting the standards and receiving public comment, in writing and at 20 hearings.

The proposed new standards would tie a school's accreditation to how well students in grades three, five, eight and high school do on new statewide tests.

Seventy percent of students would have to pass the tests, which are based on tougher academic standards approved in 1995, for the school to keep its accreditation. Schools that lose accreditation would have to submit an improvement plan but would not lose state funding.

Another commission member, state Sen. Emily Couric, D-Charlottesville, said she was worried that residents would flee districts that lose accreditation.

``I don't see that happening,'' said board member Cheri Yecke.

The accreditation standards also spell out tougher new graduation requirements and would make sex education and elementary guidance counselors a local option.

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