A much-discussed bill meant to give teachers more control over classroom discipline issues failed to complete the legislative process.
The House and Senate passed separate bills focused on how to handle student discipline problems. The question in the final week was whether differences could be resolved.
On the final day of the session, senators made some last-minute adjustments and sent the bill back to the House, where time ran out before delegates managed to agree or reject what could have been the final version.
Senate Education Chairwoman Amy Nichole Grady, speaking as the clock ticked on the final hours of the session, acknowledged the bill was up against the clock.
“It’s going to pass, probably. I just feel like, we don’t know how exactly how quick everything’s moving,” Grady, R-Mason, said late on a day that had been marked by long delays. “Things are going kind of slowly.”
She characterized the Senate’s changes that were sent to the House on the final day as mostly technical. “We just cleaned it up a little bit and approved that,” she said. “They just haven’t received the message to concur with our further changes.”
The House spent much of the final hour of the regular session debating and passing a budget bill, then raced through a stack of Senate messages to concur or reject changes.
The student discipline bill was not among the bills that House ran through.
SB 614 would have given 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.
Once a teacher makes that call, the student is required to be placed in a behavioral intervention program provided by the county. The bill had provided definitions for violent or disruptive behavior.
If a county doesn’t have access to such a program, the student involved in an incident would be immediately removed from the classroom, parents would be notified, the student would be prohibited from riding the bus and, if the student is not picked up by the end of the day, then school representatives may notify law enforcement.
The Senate’s version of the bill had focused on violent, intimidating or threatening students. The House bill broadened it somewhat to envelop disruptive and disorderly students.
“The language isn’t the same, and it’s not the same consequences as the violent, intimidating, threatening students. It deals more with removing them from the classroom and having the school discipline team decide what environment they need to be in for the rest of the day or maybe even the next day,” Grady said.
“I’m OK with that language. We had agreed to that language.”
Student behavior was among the top concerns for educators in a survey this year by the West Virginia Education Association.
Dale Lee, president of the WVEA, said in the Capitol Rotunda on Saturday night that the bill was not perfect but would have represented steps in the right direction.
“We need to address the violent student. I have no problem with that. There has to be an avenue the teacher can feel safe in the classroom,” he said.
“But we really need to address more than just that. We need to address the mental and emotional state of the students. We need to provide an alternative setting for the students in elementary school. The bill provides for that, but not every county has an alternative setting for elementary school. In essence, you’re giving a mandate that’s, for some counties, an unfunded mandate.”
He said there’s more work to be done.
“I ask the House and the Senate to come back next session,” he said, “and let’s really address the mental and emotional well-being of these students and provide a place that we can work on their academics and their behavior.”