I am opposed to any scaling by a dental assistant. I have taught dental hygiene for many years and have found that it takes about 500 hours for dental hygienists to learn basic instrumentation skills. This is a public safety issue first and foremost. In addition, scaling is only one part of preventive therapy. Dental hygienists are preventive therapy specialists and it takes a broad professional education to assess and implement  preventive care that is appropriate for each patient. 

Why are you trying to dumb down dental hygiene education? If anything, I would think that you would be interested in raising the standard of care, particularly if you have the public's interest at heart. As the Baby Boomer generation continues to age, direct access to patients by professional dental hygienists is what the Board of Dentistry should be working toward.