BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) - The Louisiana House ditched a proposal to toughen standards for the TOPS college tuition program.

The Advocate reports that lawmakers didn't debate the proposal from Baton Rouge Rep. Barry Ivey before defeating it Tuesday night. Thirty-four lawmakers voted for the bill, while 48 opposed it.

Students earn the basic TOPS award for a four-year university by scoring a minimum 20 on the ACT college exam and reaching a 2.5 high school grade point average. Ivey sought to boost that to a 2.75 GPA and a 21 ACT score.

He would have created a smaller TOPS award for students who get a 20 ACT score and a 2.5 GPA to attend a community college and transfer to a four-year university if they met certain requirements after two years.