Senate Republican Leader Stewart Iverson of Clarion says the G-O-P will again press to hold back kids for a second year of fourth grade if a student can’t read at grade level.
Iverson says results show some Iowa students test scores are slipping on reading and comprehension tests, and colleges report they have to teach more remedial classes to incoming freshman who lack some basic skills. “I think it’s very, very important that students learn how to read,” Iverson says.
Iverson says students learn how to read in the first three grades of school, and if a student doesn’t learn the basics by fourth grade, they’ll “fall behind their entire life.” Iverson says this proposal will be a priority for Republicans in the 2006 legislative session. The proposal failed in the 2005 session.