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LINCOLN — State lawmakers narrowly gave first-round approval Thursday to add more support for students reading below grade level by the end of third grade, up to repeating the grade once.
Legislative Bill 1050, a priority of Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen, led by State Sen. Dave Murman of Glenvil, advanced 26-10. It needed at least 25 votes. As originally introduced, it would mirror the so-called “Mississippi Miracle” intended to boost academic performance and require students to be held back in third grade if they were reading below grade level based on a new uniform statewide assessment.
Under the amended bill, parents of a struggling reader would receive notice that their child is struggling and, if their child is in third grade, would be invited to meet with school officials.
Parents would have the final say on whether a child should repeat the grade based on the statewide assessment, which would begin with the 2028-29 school year. By then, school districts would require “intensive acceleration” classes for students who repeat grade three.
“Rather than sending along students who aren’t prepared, we’re going to make sure kids get the support they need with the support of their parents or guardians,” Murman, chair of the Legislature’s Education Committee, said Thursday.
‘Highest calling of a democracy’
No student could be held back for reading more than once, and the bill would not apply to students who receive special education services or accommodations, who are receiving English language learning instruction for less than two years or students who participated in a supplemental reading intervention program and previously repeated a grade.
The bill would update the bipartisan “Nebraska Reading Improvement Act” approved in 2018, which already mandates schools to provide additional reading support to K-3 students. This includes reading improvement plans for struggling readers.
Former State Sens. Lou Ann Linehan of the Elkhorn area and Patty Pansing Brooks of Lincoln helped craft that 2018 law, the result of a statewide tour of schools the duo led. Linehan originally proposed a similar automatic third grade repeat bill in her freshman year, in 2017.
State Sen. Danielle Conrad of Lincoln, who supported the amended LB 1050 in part because of the final parental say, said at the “heart” of the legislation is a “good goal” to wrap more support around teachers and kids and to improve reading proficiency and skills, not just to hit a metric.
“Educating our children is one of the most important and highest calling of a democracy,” Conrad said.
Punishment or support?
Other senators saw it differently, such as State Sens. Merv Riepe of Ralston and Megan Hunt of Omaha, the latter an Education Committee member, who viewed repeating a grade as a punishment.
Riepe said a student might struggle in reading but excel in other classes, which they’d also repeat.
“They will be punished, if you will, so it’s an illogical approach,” Riepe said.
Hunt said some state senators can’t read very well and that they should understand the “shame” and anxiety that comes with struggling to read.
“That’s not a judgment, it’s an observation,” Hunt said.
She said lawmakers should look to struggling young readers with compassion and their teachers with appreciation, not grow bureaucracy and extend red tape for teachers already stretched thin.
“These layers of bureaucracy are actually the things that take away from the education time and the learning time that could achieve the goals of a bill like LB 1050,” Hunt said. “I look forward to the failure of this measure.”
Murman disagreed and said it angers him to hear LB 1050 described as a “punishment.” He noted that before fourth grade, students learn to read, and after, they read to learn.
“It’s not punitive at all,” Murman said. “The focus is to help the child get as proficient as possible.”
Governor priority bill
Parents and guardians can already require their child to repeat a grade under a 2024 law led by Conrad. In grades K-4, a grade could be repeated for academic needs, illness or excessive absenteeism, and for a later grade, for excessive absenteeism.
Pillen, in a Thursday opinion column in the Omaha World-Herald, said the “status quo isn’t working” and that the state must do more. He said LB 1050 would pair well with the “meaningful steps” Nebraska has already taken to strengthen early literacy, including millions of dollars at the state level to better train teachers who teach reading and a $55 million federal grant.
“Our proposal — in coordination with moms and dads — will help ensure that when our kids sit down to read in their fourth grade classrooms, they will do so prepared to learn, grow, and thrive,” Pillen said Thursday.
Trump Education Secretary Linda McMahon voiced support for Pillen’s original LB 1050 ahead of its public hearing in January.
‘Literacy is foundational’
The Nebraska State Board of Education, an elected statewide school board that oversees the Nebraska Department of Education, also has set a goal of ensuring at least 75% of students are proficient in reading in third grade by 2030.
State Sen. Fred Meyer of St. Paul, a former member of the State Board of Ed and a Pillen appointee to the Legislature, said the problem of teachers not being properly trained to teach reading has been a challenge for more than two decades. He supported LB 1050 as an extra step in that chain, following past efforts from Linehan and other lawmakers.
State Sen. Margo Juarez, a former Omaha Public Schools school board member, said the bill needed more time and worried retention would increase mental health challenges or the risk of a student dropping out. She worried parents might be intimidated by the process of working with schools.
“Literacy is foundational,” Juarez said. “It is not optional, it is essential, but this bill takes us in the wrong direction.”
State and local control
Some opponents also criticized the bill for being an “unfunded mandate” on schools that could raise local property taxes for implementation. The Nebraska State Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, and the Nebraska Association of School Boards oppose the bill.
State Sen. Rita Sanders of Bellevue, chair of the Legislature’s Government, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee and an Education Committee member, pledged that if the Legislature passes LB 1050, lawmakers should add funding in the next two-year state budget.
She said passing the bill is making a “promise.”
Sanders continued: “I support bold action to make sure our kids can read, but my ‘yes’ vote will be with a clear expectation for our future work with an eye towards our next session.”
State Sen. Terrell McKinney of North Omaha said if the bill advanced, there would need to be more accountability. Otherwise, students in schools opposing the measure wouldn’t be better off.
“The system is failing our kids, and we keep suggesting band-aids to solve it,” McKinney said.
‘Investing in our readers’
State Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh of Omaha said the state doesn’t want high schoolers who can’t read, nor does it want to automatically hold back students. She said the focus needs to be on interventions and hoped there would be work to bring LB 1050 to a more “moderate space.”
“I think that there’s an opportunity here to really do something great in investing in our readers,” Cavanaugh said.
Conrad and Murman said there will be negotiations before LB 1050 returns in the waning days of the 2026 session, which would only be if “significant consensus” is reached, Conrad said.
Said Conrad: “Much like we can’t cut our way to prosperity, we can’t punish our way to success.”
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