The Texas Senate suspended rules and voted Wednesday night to advance House Bill (HB) 8 to replace the STAAR exam with a new system of through-year assessments. The Senate spent just a few minutes on the bill in the Finance (not Education) Committee earlier before moving it quickly on the Senate floor. 

The Senate stripped out a House amendment that would have reduced testing to the federal minimum. The Senate also added a comprehensive, newly adopted amendment that makes several significant modifications to testing and accountability policy: 

• Beginning/Middle/End-of-Year tests (BOY/MOY/EOY tests): The Texas Education Agency (TEA) must adopt or develop BOY, MOY, and EOY assessments in reading/language arts, math, social studies, and science for certain grades, repealing a provision added on the House floor to reduce state-tested subjects to those required by federal law. 
• End-of-Course exams (EOCs): Algebra I, Biology, English I, and U.S. History remain required. English II is removed. English I must combine reading and writing into a single score. Algebra I must be administered with technology, though its use may be restricted on some parts of the test. EOCs may be split over multiple days. 
• Writing rescores: If a writing rescore would raise a student to the next performance level, it must be granted—and granted at no cost to districts or charters if the rescore improves the score. 
• Federal alignment: Opportunities to use alternate assessments in lieu of an EOC would be limited to what federal law permits. 
• Through-year growth: The House floor amendment added a requirement that TEA implement a beginning- to end-of-year growth metric as part of the accountability system beginning in the 2029-30 school year, ostensibly to replace the problematic cross-year growth metric in the current accountability system. The Senate amendment removes the implementation requirement and instead requires the commissioner to present a measure for consideration by 2029-30. 
• Industry certifications: The Senate amendment modifies how TEA creates the list of approved certifications for accountability, with automatic approval unless the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) or Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) objects. The House required TEA, THECB, and TWC to jointly create the list of industry certifications, without preferencing TEA.  
• Accountability domains: The amendment language removes “educator quality” and “school climate” as rating measures while retaining parental engagement. 
• Prioritization of supplemental instruction: Under current law, districts may not be required to provide supplemental instruction to a student in more than two subjects in a single year. The amendment requires districts to prioritize math, reading language arts, Algebra I, or English I in choosing which two. English II has been removing from the prioritization list. 

HB 8 passed on a 21–5 vote and now heads back to the House. When it arrives, House members can either request a conference committee to fight for its version, which reduced testing to federal minimums, or concur with the Senate version. 

If signed into law, HB 8 would replace optional local benchmark testing with state mandated BOY and MOY assessments in grades 3–8 and optional BOY and MOY assessments in high school-level courses with EOCs. The summative end-of-year (EOY) exam, presently STAAR, would be renamed, and the writing portion would be split off into a separate exam. Districts would be given the option to use alternative assessments such as MAP or iStation for the required BOY and MOY assessments in grades 3–8 so long as those companies produce agency-approved versions of their tests. However, it seems likely that only TEA-produced assessments would be provided to districts free of charge, creating a financial incentive to use them to meet this new mandate. At the end of the day, HB 8 replaces a testing system that mandates a minimum of two (math and reading) and maximum of four (social studies and science) testing instruments per year in grades 3–8 with one that mandates a minimum of seven testing instruments and maximum of 13 testing instruments per year in grades 3-8, while prohibiting districts from administering non-mandatory benchmark tests. 

Additional components of HB 8 include: 

• Implementation: new testing system in the 2027-28 school year, following two years of beta testing. Some aspects of the accountability system would not be impacted till at least the 2029-30 school year, or later.  
• Faster results: TEA would be required to return scores within two business days after the test administration window closes.  
• Reporting format: Results would be reported as percentile ranks against a norm reference group alongside, for at least the EOY, grade-level benchmarks, indicating whether a student has approached, met, or mastered Texas standards. 
• Teacher review: A panel of about 40 classroom teachers would vet questions for grade-level appropriateness. 
• Ban on practice tests: The bill outlaws district-administered “mock STAARs,” potentially reclaiming instructional time. 
• Accountability rules: Student scores would continue to heavily drive A–F ratings. TEA must publish any accountability rule changes by July 15 each year and refresh the standards every five years. 

Despite changes to testing format and timing, the legislation leaves untouched the high-stakes, test-and-punish structure that educators and parents have consistently opposed. Standardized test results would remain the primary measure in the A–F accountability system, meaning the new exams, no matter the name, would carry the same outsized weight as STAAR in driving ratings and interventions. 

Another troubling part of the bill removes the inability of school districts or communities to legally challenge accountability ratings in court, even when TEA may have acted outside its statutory authority. This eliminates an important check on state power and sidelines locally elected school boards, whose budgets and reputations hinge on these ratings. 

HB 8 also gives more authority to the TEA commissioner. The bill says that the commissioner alone sets and refreshes accountability standards every five years, further limiting legislative oversight and input from educators, parents, and local officials. This shift represents a growing trend of centralizing decisions about schools at the Capitol in Austin rather than empowering communities. 

While HB 8 promises additional transparency and quicker results, it does not reduce the overall footprint of high-stakes testing in Texas schools. Instead, it doubles down on the same accountability framework that has long drawn criticism, while curtailing legal recourse for districts and granting expanded power to the commissioner. We will continue watching closely as the House considers whether to concur with the Senate’s changes.