This article was originally published in The Notebook. In August 2020, The Notebook became Chalkbeat Philadelphia.
This story was published by NewsWorks on Nov. 25
The Pennsylvania legislature is one step closer to pushing back the use of standardized tests as a graduation requirement.
State law now mandates that, starting with the class of 2017, high schoolers must pass Keystone exams in Literature, Algebra I and Biology to graduate.
In a unanimous vote, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives voted this week to bump back the testing requirement by two years, so it would begin to be enforced for the class of 2019.
The Senate previously passed a similar measure by unanimous vote. The only difference is that the House wants the state Department of Education to study a possible alternative and make a recommendation within six months.
If the Senate concurs on that addition, the bill will head to Gov. Wolf, who has said he will sign it into law.