Abolish the Texas Success Initiative (TSI) test.

In Texas, any person interested in attending a state technical school, community college, or university, must pass the Texas State Initiative test. The purpose of the test is to demonstrate readiness for college level math, reading comprehension, and writing. However, the test is redundant with the SAT and ACT, is equally unrelated to student success during or after college, and creates yet another barrier for students to obtain affordable higher education. The data is clear - the more educated people are, the higher their quality of life. People who are more highly educated make more money throughout the course of their careers, experience significantly less unemployment or underemployment, engage in fewer lifestyle risks (e.g., the rate of smoking significantly decreases as education increases), seek out more preventative healthcare and earlier treatment for medical conditions, and subsequently experience much lower rates of injury and illness. All barriers to higher education should be eliminated. Abolish the TSI. It’s the right thing to do for the economic wellbeing of the state and its citizens.