The Senate agreed to the title of the bill.
Protest
Senator Runestad, under his constitutional right of protest (Art. 4, Sec. 18), protested against the passage of Senate Bill No. 161 and moved that the statement he made during the discussion of the bill be printed as his reasons for voting “no.”
The motion prevailed.
Senator Runestad’s statement is as follows:
I rise to give my “no” vote explanation on Senate Bill No. 161, which overall I support. I think it’s a good idea we need more teachers here in Michigan, but I don’t understand the provision that removes references to the time spent engaging with local employers or technical centers as counting toward certification. I have a teaching degree; I went through the whole teaching program and all the teaching classes. A lot of them, frankly, were worthless. My father was a teacher and principal, my mom was a teacher, my sister was a teacher, so I have a lot of experience in this.
One of the things, though, that was not worthless was the time I spent at a technical center in Genesee County. It was spectacular and some of the issues that were raised being in a voc ed or technical program versus a regular school were completely different. There’s enormous value in a teacher spending time in a voc ed center. Most of them have no experience, but the ones who do, I think, add a lot of value. Same thing I’ve heard from a lot of employers that a lot of academics simply have no idea what it’s like in the workplace. They say they have students coming in who are so dysfunctional and they need a lot of emotional support if a counselor or a teacher has experience working in the workplace should be valued. That should be expanding the number of teachers and this provision limits the number of teachers and very valuable teachers, so I will be a “no” vote.
The following bill was read a third time:
Senate Bill No. 162, entitled
A bill to amend 1976 PA 451, entitled “The revised school code,” by amending section 1233 (MCL 380.1233), as amended by 2021 PA 149.
The question being on the passage of the bill,
The bill was passed, a majority of the members serving voting therefor, as follows: