May 27, 2026 · Education Committee · 7,704 words · 8 speakers · 68 segments
It's 12.15 and in the interest of timeliness, we'd like to get started while you're taking your seats. Thank you. Good afternoon again. It's 1215 and I'm going to call the House Education Committee to order. And if you would please join me in a word of opening prayer.
Lord God, we thank you for bringing everyone here safely today through this rain and the weather. We thank you for the opportunity to serve the people of Ohio and the children in our state. And we ask that we would honor you in all that we do, that our conversation would be pleasing to you as we study these bills a little bit more today. In Jesus' name, amen.
The chair recognizes Ranking Member Brennan to lead the Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, and who is mobile with liberty and justice for all.
Thank you, Representative. Will the clerk please call the roll?
Chair Fowler-Arthur, here. Vice Chair Odioso, here. Ranking Member Brennan, here. Representative Byrd is excused. Representative Click, here. Representative Dean is excused. Representative Manning checked in. Representative Miller. Representative Newman. Representative Piccolantonio. Here. Representative Ritter is excused. Representative Robinson is excused. Representative Thomas.
We do have a quorum, and so we will proceed as a full committee. Would members please take a moment to review the minutes on your iPad? or whatever device it is. All right. Are there any objections to the minutes? Hearing none, the minutes are approved. Just as a reminder to our guests and members, if you would please fill out the photo or video form prior to taking any photos. These have to be signed by the chair in accordance with House and committee rules, and they can be found up by the witness stand. All right. Welcome, Representative Williams. Since you're present, I'd like to call forward House Bill 934 for its first hearing and invite Representative Williams to provide sponsor testimony. You have five minutes and then begin when you're ready.
Thank you, Chairwoman Fowler Arthur, Vice Chair Odioso, Ranking Member Brennan, and members of the House Education Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify in support of House Bill 934, the Science of Math Act today. Put frankly, the state of Ohio students is untenable right now. While math proficiency in Ohio plummeted during and after COVID-19, there existed an air of, well, let's wait and see when our schools were asked to provide solutions. Those solutions hardly came, and math proficiency among our students has seen an embarrassing low reversal. In 2019, prior to the pandemic, our state's proficiency rates in math was at 61%. Today, it stands at 55%. A math proficiency rating of 55% essentially means that 45% of Ohio students will be gate kept from high value careers that Ohio has once more begun to attract, keeping a plurality of our students away from the security of high paying jobs, which more and more is needed to efficiently and effectively raise a family and achieve home ownership. If we want our students to achieve reasonable standards in school, then we must hold our schools and students to those standards, something we have refused to do for an embarrassingly long time. Holding our state to those standards doesn't mean that we cover our eyes, throw money at our schools, or hope outcomes will improve, as many advocates have proposed before. Holding our state to these standards means that we engage our students in evidence-based standards, much like Ohio has done with the science of reading. Just as Ohio has begun to redevelop the reading methods and standards with the science of reading, I hope to lead the charge in rebuilding our students' math competence with the Science of Math Act. Despite the length of this bill, the premise of the Science of Math Act is simple. When a school is able to demonstrate that they teach students to proficiency, their education model should be copied. And when schools aren't able to teach their students to proficiency, they should have to, you know, borrow the learning methods from the schools that do it well. Now this principle, that struggling schools should learn from successful schools avails itself to a handful of new and evidence-based ways under the Science of Math. First, the Science of Math mandates that schools under a 33% proficiency rating, and third grade math use evidence-based, high-quality curriculum as designed by DEW until they achieve over 51% proficiency in third grade math. These schools and school districts will also be required to formulate school-wide improvement plans, including at a minimum an analysis of relevant student performance data, measurable student performance goals, strategies to meet specific student needs, and staffing and professional development plan, and instructional strategies for improving student performance. Second, the Science of Math Act requires schools to formulate academic intervention plans for students who demonstrate limited proficiency in mathematics or English language arts on their end of year examinations. These interventions will be deemed complete when the student is able to test at or above proficient level. These school directed plans will be based on evidence-based support, including tutoring, additional instructional time, extended school calendars, participation and learning support programs, or any other academically centered support service that will improve the student's academic performance. These schools will also allow parent guardian input and involvement in the development of these intervention services and the school will periodically recommend ways for the parent guardian to help their child. DEW will then select cohorts of schools whose students receive these services to evaluate the material quality and effectiveness of these programs from which they will formulate reports and recommendations. Finally, the science of math will ensure that teachers who are not proficient in mathematics will not be allowed to teach mathematics until they are demonstrated math proficiency with DEW. Similarly, DEW will be tasked both to develop a professional development course that focuses on how foundational mathematic competency integrates into students life and life skills and to develop professional development programs for teachers and regional education leaders on evidence-based mathematics instruction. The Science of Math Act takes a broad approach to fixing many of the deficits that we have allowed to fester in our schools, failing our taxpayers who have to fund inefficient methods of teaching, failing our communities who can no longer count in our schools being fundamental, unifying aspects in their cities and communities, and worst of all, failing our students who are being harmed by our unwillingness to do what must be done to ensure that they are taught for their futures. We will have many great strides in modernizing our curriculum and ensuring our students have access to the best possible educational materials through the science of reading and the science of math. Thank you again, Chairwoman Arthur, Father Arthur, for allowing me to testify in support of this bill. I would love the opportunity to kind of explain the difference between this and Senate Bill 19, given the opportunity. I welcome any and all questions.
Well, thank you, Representative. You took the words right out of my mouth because I was going to highlight the fact that the bill has very similar components to Senate Bill 19 when it was introduced. Yep. And just wondered if you could touch on that. And also, as you know, we've been adopting some amendments to Senate Bill 19, and I think it might diverge a little more widely from your proposal to what we have before us in that bill. If you could compare and contrast for us, please.
Sure, to the chair. So the bill's roots and foundation is Senate Bill 19. So when that was first introduced, I reached out to Senator Brenner. I loved his idea for it. I said I would prefer to take it a little bit further. We had conversations. I asked him if he would be willing to amend his bill. He said yes, but I also offered, hey I will introduce it separately in the House so I don't slow your bill down from proceeding just knowing that we have a limited legislative calendar. The main differences I see now, he had individual education plans for students as well. I believe in the sub bill and amendments that I've seen here, we kind of pulled that back here in this committee. I think that's one of the most critical pieces is that the students get an individual education plan when they fall so far behind in mathematics. I think that's critical for math and reading. I think students don't need to be diagnosed with a condition to get an IEP. I think that simply falling behind education-wise should be enough to get that individual education plan. You know, I'm standing before you as a guy that actually failed to third grade, not because I didn't understand, I was actually evaluated for a learning disability and they understood that I was actually not challenged in the class and that the school was failing me and I was actually put in honors even though I was repeating in third grade and I excelled after that. Essentially getting an individual education plan by getting screened for a learning disability. But the main difference between Senator Brenner's bill and mine is one, the threshold, mine is at 33%, which is a very low threshold for math proficiency. It says not only the school district needs to, under his bill, consider high quality math instruction. Mine requires it. It says you must adopt high quality if you drop below 33%. That means two-thirds of your students are not proficient in math. And then secondly, it also distinguishes between a school district and an actual school building. So it says 33% for the school district, but also 33% for an individual building. If we believe in our fair school funding formula and the idea of disadvantaged pupils and the supplemental funding that we give to those disadvantaged pupils, we have to understand that these school buildings are placed in different communities. One community may have a higher rate of disadvantaged pupils than another one, and that one is falling behind more than another building that's within a school district, which could slide to scales to make it where they don't get the resources that they need at that school district that's falling behind. So those are the main differences between the bill. Mine drops it all the way down to 33%. It does become mandatory that the school district or the individual school needs to adopt the high-quality curriculum. My bill says you have to do the individual education plans as well, but I understand that the committee may be rejecting that proposal. And it says that the high-quality curriculum will stay in place until at least you get back to a majority proficiency at the individual school district district or individual school, depending on which one it's applying to. So those are main differences between the two bills, is that he made it optional, mine made it mandatory. Thank you for that clarification.
Ranking Member Brennan is recognized for a question Thank you Madam Chair I think you had the question that probably everybody was going to ask so I do have another one Thanks for bringing the bill Rep Williams I share probably like everybody in the room the hope that we can find policies to ensure that every child reaches their God-given math potential in Ohio. But, you know, I asked Senator Brenner when we first heard SB19, Although we don't have a fiscal analysis of your bill, I think it's clear that there's some substantial new fiscal obligations on districts. And, you know, in his testimony before this committee, in sponsored testimony, he did indicate that he'd be open to adding some funding from the Rainy Day Fund or possibly another source. Any thoughts on that regarding your bill, if it were to move forward?
Thank you, Madam Chair. Through the chair to the ranking member, there is going to be some fiscal cost here, just like the science of reading was a fiscal cost. I think the school districts where you're struggling, you're already getting disadvantaged people funding. I mean, what are we using that for if we're not purchasing high-quality curriculum and retraining our teachers? But I would be open to the funding source. My personal proposal would be to give a longer glide path so we don't have to answer the funding source now. Instead, you could look at a line item specifically in the fair school funding formula that goes towards learning loss. So when a school district has a high percentage of children that are falling behind their grade level, that they could get supplemental funding because there's a supplemental mandate requiring you to retrain your teachers, get this new high-quality curriculum. I think that would be a better solution than just providing blanket funding, not knowing how much it's going to cost, and writing a blank check. Instead of saying school districts, when you have a high concentration of students that fall below math proficiency, such as what this bill says is two-thirds of your students are not math proficient, that means you need support from the state of Ohio. But at the same time, I'm not just going to give you more money and not give you any new guidelines. I think that's inefficient. I think I can say, hey, yes, you are going to need more money for the extra tutoring that I'm asking for, the additional hours that I'm asking for, the time away from non-core curriculum classes to take in this extra time. You're going to need to get professionals. You may need to get more paraprofessionals inside of the classroom, teaching assistants. That will cost more money, but it needs to be aligned with the number of students who are actually behind. behind. So I think if we were, if I was still in the General Assembly in this past, I would say that we should be adding into the fair school formula a line item for learning loss recovery, like we did after COVID. We gave additional funds after COVID because we knew there was a learning loss because of how many months, how many years our students were behind coming out of COVID. I think that's still there. And I like to see us not only provide the guidance, but the funding at the same time, and we know that it's going to the right thing, because it could be what we call restricted funding. You can only use this funding for X, Y, or Z. So I think it's better if we did it that way, which would say, my perfect bill would say, this doesn't go into effect until, you know, January 1st of 2028. And then we have the entire next General Assembly to have the discussion over the operating funds. And, you know, we were just debating Medicaid fraud in the other committee. committee, there's a lot of money that's going out of the window that could be going to our kids. And we kind of take that seriously in the state of Ohio. So I appreciate the question.
Follow-up? Please continue. Thank you. Have you had an opportunity to consult with any math educator organizations and get their feedback on your framework and on implementation?
And if so, what has been their take? Yeah, through the chair to the ranking member, yes. So I'm a fellow through the Hunt Keen Education Fellowship. We have another fellowship that's coming up in August, I believe. This bill came directly out of the first fellowship, the first cohort that I went to, which was what they consider the holy grail of IEPs that is coming within the next three to five years, which is AI-oriented IEPs, where you take the actual curriculum that a school is using, the actual test with the answers of the kid, the actual homework assignments, you feed it into AI, It tells you where the kid is struggling, and it helps guide you towards tutoring materials. That's like what they consider the holy grail of individual education plans moving forward for students. But one of the actual sessions that we had was on high-quality math and high-quality reading. And in that cohort, Ohio was used as a model on how to implement the science of reading. Like we talked for two to three hours about Ohio and how we did it not only by requiring a curriculum, but then going after our institutions of higher learning and requiring a curriculum being taught to the teachers and our continuing education courses for our teachers. And the idea was that it needs to be done in mathematics. And as soon as I came back from that great event, I caught Senator Brenner because I saw his bill and I said, I'm very interested in this. And they were very specific that it has to be mandatory. There is going to be some fiscal costs. You need to do it through a certain line item that matches onto the learning loss for the students so you give the resources to the school district. But you have to get to the point of requiring high-quality mathematics, mathematic curriculum, especially in states like Ohio where we don't have centralized curriculum standards. We kind of have guidance and each school district is allowed to get whatever curriculum they want, including our charter schools. Thanks.
Thank you.
Miller is recognized for a question. Thank you, Chair. Through the Chair, Representative, I've got so many questions, but because you got so much here, but I'll try to not be redundant with some of that was said, and I'll try to get to the heart of a few other things I had. One of it was about funding and the amount of money that it costs to create and monitor and pull out students for the RIMPs. I'd love to see a fiscal analysis. That's not come, but that would be great. My question is, you have in here that an applicant has to prove they're proficient in math. That is a very generic term because kindergarten math, eighth grade math, completely different. Right now, do you know what the requirements are in mathematics for somebody who's going to get a license, a student, or excuse me, a teacher, soon-to-be teacher is going to take the test, get their license? Do you know what – sorry. Do you know what – do you know – You brought the toys in, didn't you? Do you know what exactly the requirements are currently under the licensing board for mathematics for K-8? I'm not sure about them.
Through the chairs, the representative, I'm not sure what they are. My personal experience, one being a school board president of a charter school and having friends that actually teach and talking to them, What we've started to see an explosion of substitute teacher licenses actually teaching in schools, including in our charter schools. So, you know, I had a friend of mine that has a bachelor's degree in business that was teaching fifth, sixth, and last year's seventh grade, including math. And it was all based off of the curriculum that the school adopted. It was simply reviewing the curriculum and teaching the curriculum. There wasn't any prior requisite of him having particular math skills or proficiencies or anything like that. What I'm trying to get to the point is that when our school districts are falling so far behind, there has to be some recovery. There has to be some standard that DEW sets. I don't want to be the one that dictates that. I want DEW to set what those standards are to make sure that the kid is not the one falling behind. And we can't just say, look, we're going to use a new workbook. And it's not a high-quality workbook. But you say, what did you do from last year's low test scores? Well, we switched to a new curriculum provider. Well, that may not be high-quality curriculum. That may just be apples-to-apples curriculum that already was filling the students. So the idea is similar to the science of reading, I want our teachers to also become proficient, but I'm more than willing to have conversations offline about what those requirements would be. I understand my bill is introduced at a late time. I don't anticipate this passing during this General Assembly, but I wanted to have this discussion because I know Senate Bill 19 is being debated. And if there's portions of my bill that is liked, I would love it to be amended into that bill. And I've talked to Senator Brenner about that. I mean, the big point for me is that there shouldn't just be a 50 percent threshold that says, hey, this raises a yellow flag. You guys should consider an academic recovery plan and consider using high quality. I think there should also be a bottom dollar, a bottom line amount that you drop below 33%. This is no more a yellow flag. This is a red flag. We've got to bring in reinforcements. We've got to redo the way that we think mathematics within the school building and get high-quality curriculum there. And that's the goal of my portion of the bill of what is different than Senate Bill 19. That's the goal. Thank you, and I'll just sit in the queue until you're ready.
You can have a brief follow-up if you'd like, Rev.
Yes. Thank you, then, real quick. Do you have the data as to right now, and I apologize, I don't know if this is just a requirement for public schools or charter schools or private schools, like where this is focused. I think all kids matter, so it should cover all kids, but I don't know in this language if clear enough, whether it's all the kids or just the public school. And then if it is, do we have a data point that tells us how many are already below that right now?
Through the chair to the ranking member, I knew I would get that question from you. You always do. I always get that question from you. So it does cover charters. It does not cover non-publics. So it does cover our charter public schools. I do have an entire breakdown Excel spreadsheet of every single school district and every single school building and what their math proficiency ratings are.
Could you share that?
Yes. There are some ones that are really low. And based off of looking at that is where I came to the 33% number. Because I said, let me look at how many schools are below 50. It was a lie. 40. 35. I kept going down more and more to get to the really bad ones. And I'm more than willing to even go lower and say 25%. If only a quarter of your students are not proficient, I think we all should agree that something has to change. And it's not that the students continue to go to that school while we consider different leadership in the school district or new teachers. Something drastic has to change because, you know, I've been a dad raising students and I felt trapped in a school district. And my option was to take Ed Choice and go to a private school where my son excelled and then eventually went back to a public school school but my option was to get out of that public school Not everybody has that has that option I was able to buy a home in a different area and get them into a different school district Not everybody has that option. Many people are trapped in that school district. And where I started my charter school compared to that public school, that public school has still not improved in the last 15 years since my kid was there. So at some point, I don't know what that threshold is, but I would encourage the committee to consider a bare bottom number and say, hey, if you fall below this, you are mandated to take these steps moving forward and that's why I'm in front of the committee today because I know you guys are considering Senate Bill 19 and I know it didn't have mandates inside of it, but I think we have to have a bare bottom and maybe put the mandates in and put a long glide path in front of them of 28 or 29 and then you can have discussions in the next General Assembly about how particularly we're gonna fund the supplemental funding for learning loss in mathematics and reading. I think that's important.
Thank you. Representative Piccola Antonio.
Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Representative, for being here today to have this conversation. I think that, I guess I shouldn't speak for all of us, but I completely agree with the goal of making sure that our kids all are math literate. Math literacy is, I mean, it's just as important as any other kind of literacy. We've put a lot of time and attention toward reading, and so I don't disagree with that goal in any way. I'm wondering, though, so a lot of the testimony that we heard from stakeholders, particularly about the administration of doing a MIMP, is that just from a practical perspective, when you think about the school day, when you think about the school week, the number of hours, there isn't right now a way to add another thing like that into, sorry, Chair, may I finish my question?
Thank you.
I'll just summarize and just ask. Yeah, I think you understand what I'm asking. Like from a practical implementation standpoint, how does that work?
Through the chairs, the representative. So, I mean, if we're talking about a school district or a school building where you have out of a fifth grade class two students that are not proficient, and I'm telling you take those two students and provide them with supplemental educational experiences, yeah, that could cause a burden of the school having that extra professional to be able to do it, and when are you going to fit that in the schedule? But when you start getting down to 33% proficiency in a single school building in third grade, that's two-thirds of the classroom is not math proficient, it becomes what do you do with the kids that are proficient? Well, they get to go onto their non-core curriculum class or gym or whatever it is, and the other two-thirds stay behind for additional math instruction. That's why when you get it down to a certain point, it's the majority of the class. So now you're not pulling out one or two students. It's actually the majority. And maybe the school does extra time with the regular teacher, or at one of my son's schools, there was a teacher that only taught math. And that teacher went around to fourth, fifth, and sixth grade. You had your homeroom, and then you had your math teacher. And that teacher went around. Maybe that specific teacher spends more time with that particular class. I think at a certain point, that has to happen in order to get the actual learning recovery that we want.
Would you like a follow-up? Follow-up, please. Thank you. I appreciate that answer. I guess related to the question and thinking about how we came up with a plan for reading, a lot of what was done was to look to some other states that had successfully gone down the path, and they had results that we could see. How do we make sure with this that whatever it is that we're doing, that it is actually going to improve math literacy?
Yeah. Through the chair, it's the representative. So I can get you some stats. So at the cohort that I attended, I think it was either Mississippi or Louisiana was a state that had the biggest substantial growth in math and reading proficiency. And they took an approach similar to this, not of mandatory high curriculum, but the high curriculum standard, the IEPs for individual students and getting them. And they did a substantial financial investment into their school district. And but they have very, very low funding compared to the state of Ohio previously. And they had very successful outcomes for the kids and students. And we talked extensively about that state program. And I've met with that organization since I've been back from there. I think that was last September that I went. Since I've been back with her, we had Zoom calls with them three different times to talk about what is high-quality math instruction. What is high-quality reading instruction? Well, that's up to your state, but here's some of the vendors that provide this, and it's all about educational outcomes. So it's no different than when we look at our charter schools. We have regular charter schools, high-quality charter schools. High-quality charter schools, by definition, are based on another high-quality charter school model. So we now recognize the difference between standard charter schools and high-quality charter schools based on a high-quality model. We're saying we should actually look at curriculum that are based on a high-quality model as well. And that would be up to DEW's choosing what curriculum would meet that standard. But there are curriculum that's already been proven in other states to be high-quality and help with learning loss recovery after COVID.
Thank you. Do we have further questions? Representative Piccola Antonio, one last one.
Thank you, Chair. Again, I guess just in comparing what we did with reading to what this bill is proposing to do with math, and I don't want to belabor the funding point, but one of the things that came up repeatedly is that in order to make a change like this, there's got to be some intense training of teachers. There's got to be thought given to our teacher training education programs at the higher education level. There's got to be time to do all of those things and refunding money to do all of those things, to be able to make a change like that with fidelity. So I guess how do you – I know you're not going to be able to answer the funding source question, but does this bill contemplate all of that?
So through the chair to the member, the only part that I don't contemplate is the higher education piece, which just like the science of reading, it kind of came in stages. To get to the point of curriculum that's guided towards institutions of higher learning, we were able to accomplish that goal. Part of what we said here was that additional educational experience for the student can be tutoring and learning loss recovery. What I've seen is that there are avenues to bring in third-party providers that are outside of the expense of the school district, and I'll give you an example. So at my charter school, coming out of COVID, one of the things we did was we went to a third-party behavioral health specialist, and we used COVID dollars, and they were able to bill insurance, Medicaid mostly directly, for learning loss recovery. And they were able to do in-school tutoring, after-school tutoring that was paid for. And we were able to align them with the student. Now, some students actually had, you know, IEP, some had diagnoses for other things, but we were actually able to do academic recovery. So some of it we used COVID dollars for and paid them directly to do academic recovery. Some of it was built through insurance in order to get that provided. And we saw a substantial jump from the kids that were falling behind because of COVID to getting them at least closer to grade level, if not up to grade level by the end of that first year, because my charter school opened during COVID. So we had to fight through COVID our first year and then the learning loss recovery in our second and third year. And we were able to make jumps by using that model. And it was a behavioral health third party. And I've always encouraged not only our public schools but our private schools to allow those entities to come in because they can also offer counseling and other resources by using insurance coverage, including private insurance coverage.
Thank you. Last question to Representative Miller.
Thank you, Chair. Through the chair, so I put more thought into this kind of getting teachers prepared and making sure that they're effective and efficient. Would there be any interest in maybe considering instead of, hey, you can pass a math test, maybe if you're going to teach math, you have to get a certification that actually will go into the reading side of it. So maybe we're having English issues. They're not passing the reading test. You can go in and get, I will call it like Kleenex, a Wilson reading endorsement. Maybe there is a math endorsement. Because really what it comes down to is the pedagogy. It's the ability to teach kids that are learning differently the math concepts. It's not whether I can throw a ball. It's can I teach you how to throw the ball. And so is there any interest in maybe saying you need to go, and any teacher that's teaching math in your building that's under 33% has to go get this endorsement so we know they're properly skilled. Is that a thought on that? Yeah, through the chair, it's the representative. I get the analogy. I was a pitching coach in high school. I could never throw over 84 miles an hour, but I was coaching kids that were in their 90s, and I still was able to teach them different pitches and how to control their mechanism. So I get the analogy. What I think we could do is look at the high school. if we got part of this bill in statute and said DEW was going to screen and determine what is high quality curriculum, whether it's reading or math. And that essentially, when we reach this very low threshold for a teacher to teach that high quality math, they at least have to be certified in the curriculum that the school district chooses. I think that's something that could easily be done, is that there's a certificate that says you've reviewed the curriculum, you understand the curriculum, you show them proficiency, and being able to know the curriculum, teach the curriculum, and you get a certificate from whatever the publisher is of that particular curriculum, and that's adequate to say we're gonna use this curriculum, and this teacher has a certificate of completion through the whatever course. And I have seen some curriculum models that have that attached to it. That would be something I'm more than willing to discuss.
Yes, absolutely. I think it's necessary that we get to that point of having high quality curriculum, teachers that are trained in that high quality curriculum, and get it to the student, and at the same time put on some tutoring over extra time to be able to make up for the learning loss that we experienced. Thank you very much. I don't see any further questions, but we look forward to continuing the discussion,
and thank you for your testimony today.
Thank you. This will conclude the first hearing on House Bill 934. I'd now like to call forward Senate Bill 318 for its second hearing and invite Tom Radican of the Catholic Conference to offer proponent testimony. Welcome to committee. You have five minutes and may begin when you're ready.
Good morning, Chair Fowler-Arthur, Vice Chair Odioso, Ranking Member Brennan. Good morning members of the House Education Committee Thank you for the opportunity to provide proponent testimony in support of Senate Bill 318 I Tom Radican Associate Director with the Catholic Conference of Ohio Senate Bill 318 is a very narrow bill that will provide non-home rule townships with the authority in the Ohio Revised Code to provide school resource officer services to chartered non-public schools within their jurisdiction. As you heard from Senator Katrona, we could describe it as a cleanup bill designed to answer a concern raised by the Ohio Attorney General in an opinion rendered back in September of 2025. The AG noted that while the revised code provided authority for non-home rule townships to provide SRO services to public districts, that we could not infer that same authority extended to charter non-public schools. And so this bill extends that authority to chartered non-public schools. For example, in Poland Township, we have Holy Family Catholic School, 295 students, K-8. A few years ago, the Poland Township Board of Trustees and the Poland Police partnered with the school, and they entered into an MOU to provide important safety and security measures, SRO services. Testimony from the Township Board and their police chief are in the record. They may even be here. as well as testimony from Holy Family, the principal who I talked to this morning briefly, as well as the Youngstown Diocese, all explaining in more detail all of the benefits of an SRO in their school. So to conclude, Senate Bill 318 will add the simple but necessary clarity to the Ohio Revised Code so we can continue to provide SRO services on firm legal ground. and thank you for the opportunity to testify
happy to answer any questions. Thank you for your testimony and yes as you noted we do have several written testimonies including the one I think you mentioned from several folks in the Poland area and the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police as well. I have Ranking Member Brennan with a question.
Thank you Madam Chair. Thanks for coming in Mr. Radican. Good to see you again. It's been a pleasure working with you and getting to know you on the school transportation work group. I enjoyed the conversation we had the other day for about an hour after that meeting, in fact.
As I did.
Thank you. So a couple quick questions. Thank you, Madam Chair. So, you know, in the Parma Police Department, like police departments around the state, human resources are at a premium. So if it comes down to a human resources issue, who gets priority of those few SROs? Would it be the public schools, the private schools? How do you envision that being determined?
Well, I can't speak for the Poland Township Board of Trustees, but I think they have to weigh the priorities there. I do know that we, again, I mentioned I talked to the principal this morning. we do pay for those services. What that same officer does after school or in the summer, I would imagine that the township pays for that service. But I do not know. But what I do know is the township is happy with the financial arrangement, and that's why they've entered into that MOU with the school.
Fair enough. Follow-up?
Please continue.
Thank you. So as we all know, you know, the public schools are subject to extensive transparency laws and elected oversight by their elected school board. If there are complaints against an SRO in a private school, how would those complaints be handled?
Through the chair? I'm not sure. I would imagine it would have to be governed by the MOU. but that would have to be a very deliberate system of procedures, I would think. That's kind of a serious personnel issue, I would imagine, if it's related to the officer. I guess it could be some activity related to school personnel, in which case it may take a different route. We could probably get some clarification through LSC, I believe, in some of the cases with our local public schools, that it goes back to a meeting between the chief, the authorizing township, and the school district.
Thanks.
Representative Miller.
Thank you, Chair. Thanks for being here. Real quick question. I got half of the answer just a moment ago through your response to Rep. Brennan, And that is the two things I was going to ask is in the language, this is not a shall. This is a may. And the agreement is for the cost is negotiated in MOU. So this could be an easy yes or no answer. I don't know. What do you think?
Say that again.
So, yes, do we have it is a may, not shall in the bill. The language is may. So the township doesn't have to provide this. They're not being forced to, under Ohio Revised Code, when you ask for it to provide it. Is that correct?
Through the chair, that is absolutely correct. So LSE would confirm that.
And then the second part of that is it is not only does it say that it may provide that service, that the cost is negotiated and that it can come through an MOU or some sort of agreement between the township and the school district or school building, whatever, correct?
Through the chair, yes. They would have to come to an agreement, and it would be captured in that MOU as the services and the payment schedule. May I, since it's, yes.
One very last quick. With that being the case, then, and since this contract is between a public entity and your private school, would it still be open so that people can look at what that agreement is, what it entails, what it costs the township? And it costs you?
That would be a question probably best addressed to the townships in terms of what they keep as their open records available to the public through the township. It would be a township MOU. Yeah, Representative, there is testimony, written testimony from the township trustees in Poland, as well as the chief of police, that might address some of the questions that you're raising.
All right. Well, I haven't had a chance to read them. They just got put up, so we're good to go. I'll take a look at them. Thank you, Chair.
Representative Piccola Antonio is recognized.
Thank you, Chair. Thanks for being here today. So one of the things that is required of an individual who's going to serve as a school resource officer is some mandated training, basic training that they have. And we had a little bit of conversation with the bill sponsor about this, but I'm trying to understand why we would exempt the SROs for the school year 26-27 from that training. As the bill sponsor said, even though the AG's opinion was issued, a lot of those individuals are still in place. Okay.
Through the chair. I thought they were directing that exemption at the year prior to 26-27, meaning the current school year is exempt, meaning the year that we're in. I believe so, but please continue, Representative.
Thank you. So it exempts them from – this is 2026 now. So 2026-27 school year would be starting in August of 26, going through May or June of 27, which is future. I'm just trying to wrap my head around why they would need to be exempted from training if they have been in place. It's my understanding that they've been in place, so they would have been doing that training.
So through the chair, so for the, I believe the bill exempts the training requirement for the current, the 25, 26 year, the year we're in that we're about to end any day now. So I think it was just looking at the reality of perhaps the, from the township perspective, that their officers haven't, maybe have not had the training required that would otherwise be required of service to the public school that they're, that they may or may not be doing. but they may in fact have completed all of the training. That may be a better question for the township police as to what regardless of the current law not requiring it, whether they are already requiring SRO training for their officers even though it's not mandated by law. I think it might be helpful to turn to Rachel with LSC and just we're looking at the bill analysis document. could you help us shed some light on whether the 26-27 school year exemption is for the 26-27 school year
or if that is referring to the school years that have already passed? Yes, of course, Chair. The bill actually says, it says prior to the 26-27 school years, So presumably I think that would be this current school year, the 25-26, as the 26-27 school year starts in August. So the bill is prior to how you want to interpret this.
Thank you very much for that clarification.
Do we have any further questions from the committee for Mr. Radican? All right. Seeing none, thank you for coming in today. We appreciate your testimony.
Thank you.
This will conclude the second hearing on Senate Bill 318, and please do refer back to those written testimonies. I'd now like to call House Bill 711 for its third hearing. Is there anyone present that would like to testify? We did not receive any written testimony. Oh, I'm sorry. We received written testimony, no request to testify in person. you'll find that written testimony on your iPad. And seeing no one jumping up and down to come up to the podium, this will conclude the third hearing on House Bill 7-11. And seeing no further business before the committee, the Education Committee stands adjourned. Thank you.