The Ohio House passed a bill that would allow school districts to create a policy to expel a student that poses an “imminent and severe endangerment” to the safety of other students or school staff for 180 school days, and possibly longer.
House Bill 206 passed with a 65-15 vote during Wednesday’s session. The bill now heads to the Ohio Senate for consideration. Any bill that does not pass by the end of the year will die and would have to be reintroduced next General Assembly.
State Reps. Gary Click, R-Vickery, and Monica Robb Blasdel, R-Columbiana, introduced H.B. 206 last summer, which passed in the Ohio House Primary and Secondary Committee a little over a year ago.
“House Bill 206 will grant greater flexibility to schools when expelling dangerous individuals, while also producing a re-entry plan designed to promote the safety and protection of all students and staff,” Robb Blasdel said.
She said the bill will give more control to school administrators, parents and mental health professionals “when dealing with the most difficult and stressful cases they encounter, understanding that these decisions are best made at the local level.”
H.B. 206 defines “imminent and severe endangerment” as bringing a firearm or a knife “capable of causing serious bodily injury” to school, making a bomb threat to a school building, causing serious physical harm to someone at school or making an “articulated or verbalized threat, including a hit list, threatening manifesto, or social media post, that would lead a reasonable person to conclude that the pupil poses a serious threat,” according to the bill’s language.
The bill would allow a district school board to create a policy that would authorize the superintendent to create conditions for an expelled student to meet before being reinstated — including an assessment by a psychiatrist, licensed psychologist, or licensed school psychologist to evaluate if the student poses a danger.
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After the assessment, the expelled student can be reinstated “if the superintendent determines that the pupil has shown sufficient rehabilitation,” according to the bill.
A student’s expulsion can be extended 90 days at a time and there is no limit on how many times a student’s expulsion may be extended, according to the bill.
“Our current law says that you can only be expelled for 180 days, and then you must be permitted to return to school, readmitted unconditionally,” Click said. “And while we do believe in rehabilitation, we also think that there ought to be safety first. We ought to consider the safety of our students, safety of our teachers, the safety of the faculty and everyone that’s on that property. This just allows flexibility for schools to make sure that the student has been rehabilitated and that the students and the teachers are safe when the student returns to school.”
There are about 180 school days in an average school year and the bill would require the superintendent to come up with a list of alternative educational options for the expelled student.
While all of the votes against the bill came from Democrats, 10 Democrats voted for the bill. Ohio House Minority Leader Allison Russo, D-Upper Arlington, was one of the 15 Democrats who voted against the bill.
“For me, it was the disproportionate impact that expulsions have on children of color,” Russo said on why she voted against the bill. “I don’t think that there are enough safeguards in that bill to protect and provide necessary mental health and behavioral health support for children who are in … crisis. I think there’s a more thoughtful way to do that.”
Children’s Defense Fund Ohio released a report earlier this year that found that Black male students were 4.3 times more likely to be suspended or expelled than their white peers.
The report discovered that Black students represented 39.7 per 100 students with “discipline occurrences.” Disabled students who were suspended or expelled accounted for 22.2 of every 100 students and students considered economically disadvantaged saw 21.5 discipline occurrences per 100 students.
The Ohio Poverty Law Center said the bill is well-intentioned, but needs work.
“HB 206 … still places far too much discretion in the hands of school officials to expel a student indefinitely,” Ohio Poverty Law said in a statement. “One of the greatest predictors of academic success is being present in the classroom, and we must exercise extreme caution when giving schools the power to remove students from school for extended periods.”
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