MADISON, Wis. -- The state Legislature passed a series of education reform bills designed to make the state compete for nearly $4.5 billion in federal stimulus money.

The Assembly voted 47 to 46 in favor of the reform bills around 3 a.m. on Friday morning after a long closed door meeting among Democrats. The Senate approved the measures earlier on Thursday.

The action came after President Barack Obama came to Madison on Wednesday to tout the Race to the Top grant program.

One of the bills would create a system to track student data from preschool through college. A second bill would tie teacher evaluation to student performance on standardized tests. Another bill would require all charter schools to be created under federal guidelines. The last bill would move grants awarded to Milwaukee Public Schools for student achievement to move from Department of Administration to Department of Public Instruction control.

The bills remove a prohibition in state law from using student test data to evaluate teachers.

Even with it removed, teachers could not be disciplined or removed based on student test scores. And the teacher evaluation process would have to be part of collective bargaining.

Republicans argued that means most schools won't even attempt to use the test data when evaluating teachers. Attempts by them to alter the bill were defeated by Democrats.

Senate Republicans expressed concern about the teacher evaluation portion, saying collective bargaining could become a hurdle to the Race to the Top guidelines and that teachers should also be disciplined or fired based on standardized testing results, not only rewarded.

"(Obama) said we have to be bold in holding people accountable for the achievement of our schools. Well, trust me, if we pass this legislation requiring mandatory negotiations we're not bold, we're a joke," said Sen. Luther Olson, R-Ripon.

The bill passed the Senate with one Republican vote.

Now even the Democrat in the Senate who was skeptic about how the state could sustain education reforms said he believes they're the right thing to do.

Sen. Mark Miller said he received information from the Department of Education in response to a letter he sent this week. He said he now believes the bills are in the state's best interest.

"They provided some information that I hadn't had previously, that was available but I hadn't had, and I was concerned that we might be committing ourselves to a long-term commitment at this time, and we are not," Miller said.

Democratic lawmakers had been trying to fast-track the bills to get them passed before the end of the regular session Thursday in order to have the laws in place when Wisconsin makes its application to Race to the Top by the end of this month.