Ohio Senate passes education overhaul

Dec. 11—COLUMBUS — The Ohio Senate passed a bill Wednesday that would reorganize the Ohio Department of Education and strip most of the responsibilities from the Ohio State Board of Education. Senate Bill 178 passed 22-7, largely on party lines.

"This is simply a vote for parents and their children," said Senate President Matt Huffman, R-Lima. "Too often large bureaucracies like the Department of Education are only accountable to themselves, and results are buried under layers of paperwork and red tape. That changes today."

Having passed the Senate, SB 178 now moves to the Ohio House of Representatives for consideration. It's not clear if the House will take action on the measure before adjourning. House Speaker Bob Cupp has not said whether he will make the bill a priority before the end of the year, when the two-year legislative session ends and all bills that haven't passed die.

"It's very late in the session," Cupp said. "It's something that has been discussed and debated for decades. Having an education system that works that is effective that is not mired in bureaucracy is important. I'm not sure what the outcome will be, but it's something that is very much under consideration. If it's going to happen, it's going to happen in the next week or so."

SB 178 would rename the Ohio Department of Education to the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, or DEW. DEW would be led by a director, which would be a cabinet-level position under the governor. The department head would make most of the decisions currently made by the Ohio State Board of Education, including decisions on state testing, developing learning standards and model curricula for Ohio's 1.7 million K-12 students.

Under SB 178, the state school board would still appoint a state superintendent. But the superintendent also would lose most of its power, working as an advisor to the director of DEW and a secretary to the state school board, which would have oversight of just a handful of tasks, such as territory transfers and educator licenses.

"The Senate deserves to be commended for recognizing the urgency of the moment. Post-pandemic, Ohio students are facing tremendous challenges to get back on track, especially in math where students are on average still half a year to a full year behind where they'd typically be," said Chad Aldis, vice president for Ohio Policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. "We need strong, aligned, bold leadership to improve our education system. Unfortunately, our current governance structure for K-12 education has proven not to be up to the task."

The Ohio School Boards Association cautioned in bill testimony Tuesday that under SB 178, important decisions about the state's learning standards, graduation requirements and school district report cards would be left to bureaucrats in DEW.

Huffman said the bill would change education policy in Ohio for "decades to come," pointing out that the Ohio Constitution gives the state school board authority over only hiring the superintendent. It leaves other duties to the laws set by the legislature and signed by the governor.

"Governors have an incentive to respond to the legislature. There's a lot of things governors want to do: They want their budgets passed, they have their policies," Huffman said on the Senate floor Wednesday. "The governor cares about what the state senate thinks. Right now, the Ohio Department of Education couldn't care less about what any of you thought."

Sen. Andrew Brenner, R-Delaware, said Tuesday, "This bill, by the way, is not perfect." But "there seems to be no urgency coming from the Ohio Department of Education. It's not there. It hasn't been there for several years."

Something needs to change, Brenner said, and he thinks Senate Bill 178 is a step in the right direction.

All of the state board's current education responsibilities such as curriculum, implementation of new laws and strategic planning would transfer to this new director. The board would keep control over teacher licensing and territory transfers.

"This bill proposes placing more power in the executive branch, which will silence the public's voice, access and transparency regarding education policymaking," Ohio Federation of Teachers President Melissa Cropper said.