Committee approves temporary reciprocity, removes time window for out‑of‑state teacher experience

The Senate Education Committee unanimously advanced Senate Bill 126 after testimony from educators, rural superintendents and association representatives who said the bill would ease hiring during a persistent teacher shortage.

Senator Marchman, the bill sponsor, said the measure has two parts: it eliminates a requirement that three years of prior teaching experience be within the past seven years, and it directs the state education agency to enter temporary reciprocal agreements with compact member states to grant equivalent licenses while the Interstate Teachers Mobility Compact completes rulemaking. "This bill simply says, if you have 3 years of successful teaching experience, it counts regardless of when it happened," the sponsor said.

Educators who moved across state lines described costly and confusing relicensing processes. "Adopting the interstate teacher mobility compact would create a clearer, more consistent pathway for qualified educators who move between states," Erin Gold, an Aurora Public Schools civil rights coordinator and former classroom teacher, told the committee. Megan Raines of the Colorado Education Association and Danelle LaPlatte of the Colorado Rural Schools Alliance emphasized the bill’s importance for rural districts that often lack substitute capacity and face slow hiring timelines.

Committee members questioned how the state verifies candidate quality. CDE staff and the state’s compact representative said existing checks include a degree from a regionally accredited institution, completion of an approved teacher‑preparation program and demonstration of content knowledge; the compact work has been delayed primarily by the need to build a centralized data system that compact states require.

The committee adopted two technical amendments (L001 and L002) — one clarifying reciprocity categories and one aligning language with CDE‑recommended technical fixes — and then moved the bill to the Committee of the Whole by unanimous roll call. Sponsors said the temporary reciprocity language will sunset when the compact is operational.