CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A much-talked about Senate bill focused on student behavior and discipline in school has reached the full House.
The bill comes from Senate Education Committee Chair Amy Grady, R-Mason. The full Senate passed the bill 32-1 back in February.
The House Education Committee first began working on the bill Monday with multiple amendments flying in for it. There was longer discussions had that day and on Wednesday.
House Education Committee Chairman Joe Ellington, R-Mercer, opted to take up the bill at the beginning of their committee meeting Wednesday knowing it was one of the more important pieces and he expected lengthy debate with committee members.
“We had two amendments to start and then we ended up with five of them,” said Ellington.
Committee members voted to advance the bill to the House floor. Ellington said he and a few others on the committee were against that.
“Some of them said that there was enough discussion previously that they felt that they had beaten it to death,” he said. “That’s why they wanted to move it along.”
Due to time constraints Wednesday, the committee did move the bill to the full House and then took up other important bills on their agenda.
The bill ended up passing out of House Education. It is now on 2nd reading in the House for Thursday.
SB 614 would ultimately give more authority to elementary school teachers when dealing with disruptive students in their classroom. A teacher in grades kindergarten through 6 can determine if a student’s behavior is too violent, threatening or intimidating or creates an unsafe learning environment in the classroom.
The student would then be placed in a behavioral intervention program provided by the respective county, if they have access to such program. If they do not, the student would be removed from the classroom, their parents would be notified of the situation, and they are prohibited from riding the bus.
A suspension of one to three days would follow for the student until he or she is put into an alternative learning setting. The student would also have to complete a risk assessment before returning to school.