Today, the Senate passed a bipartisan bill that will give teachers the tools to ensure every child has a high quality education. Senate Bill 5895 would follow an existing state effort to move to a statewide four-tier teacher evaluation system by 2015-16, after eight pilot programs have completed tests of what works best. Before 2010, teachers were given either a satisfactory or unsatisfactory grade under a two-tier system.

Over the last week, Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe, D-Bothell, Sen. Steve Litzow, R-Mercer Island, Rep. Kristine Lytton, D-Anacortes, Rep. Bruce Dammeier, R-Puyallup, and Gov. Gregoire worked hard to reach a compromise on teacher evaluation legislation and released statements on the final bill, which can be found here.