Life is always more entertaining during the legislative season, especially when courageous (or naive) legislators take on the education monolith. Two recent examples:

In a state that prides itself on doing things the old fashioned way, Montana's GOP Representative Roger Koopman submitted a bill that would have let college grads into the classroom, and if they proved to be effective, granted them full certification after a year. What a novel idea!

Not only did this crazy idea for a bill not pass, a crowd of teacher union members in the House session's audience got a little rowdy after Rep. Gordon Hendrick spoke against the bill, calling it "an insult to the institution of education." Hendrick later apologized to all of his colleagues, saying "It was just getting out of hand."

In Georgia, the House Education Committee passed a very different bill, but not without disapproving comments from those ever-reliable stalwarts for reform, the state's Professional Standards Commission. "I just don't see where it's needed," said F.D. Toth, the Commission's executive secretary.

Two things are worth noting about HB 603: first, it doesn't exactly tear down the fortress. It only allows districts to hire secondary teachers with masters or doctorates in the subjects they will teach (or who have law degrees). What's more, they would be required to make "satisfactory progress toward full certification," meaning they'd still get have to go through a full ed school program.

Second, the bill contains an intriguing proviso cautioning local school districts to "not discriminate or treat differently in any manner a teacher certified or an applicant seeking certification pursuant to this Code section, including, but not limited to, refusal to admit such teacher to a job fair or other teacher recruitment activity." Makes you wonder why they need to make this explicit.