State Rep. Kristine Lytton has been named to a bipartisan committee that will monitor how a new law designed to help persistently failing public schools improve goes into effect.

Drafted in large part by Lytton, D-Anacortes, Senate bill 5329, approved in this year’s legislative session, directs the Office of the Superintendent of Public Schools to develop criteria for determining which schools fall into the lowest-performing category and to create solid guidelines to help them improve.

The Education Accountability Oversight Committee will be organized sometime in the fall. The committee will oversee implementation of the law, which is intended to help failing schools improve their performance through support, guidance and, if necessary, direct intervention by OSPI.

“Every school, including those that are persistently performing below our expectations, contains good teachers, capable administrators and children who can excel,” said Lytton, who help craft the new law. “We have to find the key, or keys, that will help them be the best they can, and we can’t afford to wait.”

The legislature will provide funds to help those schools – if in fact funding is determined to be a problem – and they’ll have three years to make marked improvement. If they haven’t made significant, measurable progress during that time, OSPI will have the authority to intervene with more structured guidance.