State Board of Education

Tess Elshoff, President – Nancy Hollister, Vice President

Paolo DeMaria, Superintendent of Public Instruction

Summary of Senate Bill 216

As Passed by the Senate

State achievement assessments

• Requires the Department to request an analysis from the test vendor explaining how questions on each of the state achievement assessments and end-of-course exams are aligned to the statewide academic content standards. (ORC 3301.078)

• Requires the Department to request from the test vendor information and materials for assistance with the state achievement assessments, including practice tests and other preparatory materials. (ORC 3301.078)

• Permits public and chartered nonpublic schools to administer the third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade state achievement assessments in a paper format or a combination of online and paper formats. Allows schools to administer the assessments in either format on a student-by-student basis. (ORC 3301.0711)

Kindergarten readiness assessment

• Requires the Early Childhood Comprehensive Assessment Advisory Group to make recommendations for improving the kindergarten readiness assessment. (Section 6)

Reading improvement plans

• Requires a school district, community school, or STEM school in which less than 80% of its students attain a “proficient” score on the third-grade English language arts assessment to establish a reading improvement plan supported by reading specialists. (ORC 3301.0715)

School mandate reports

• Requires the Department to establish, distribute, and monitor a school mandate report for school districts. Requires each school district or school to complete and file a school mandate report on an annual basis and provide a written explanation to its board of education if an item within the report was not completed. This report includes: (1) staff training on the use of physical restraint or seclusion on students; (2) staff training on harassment, intimidation, or bullying; (3) staff training on the use of cardiopulmonary resuscitation and automated external defibrillators; (4) the establishment of a wellness committee; (5) compliance with nutritional standards; (6) screening of students for sensory or health problems and developmental disorders; and (7) compliance with open enrollment laws. (ORC 3301.68)

State report card

• Increases from 10 to 30 the minimum number of students in a subgroup for student performance data to be reported. (ORC 3302.03)

Nonteaching employee contracts

• Requires nonteaching school employees to be employed for seven years, rather than three years, prior to receiving a continuing contract (tenure). (ORC 3319.081)

Educator license grade bands

• Sets educator license grade bands as only preK-5, 4-9, or 7-12. (ORC 3319.22)

Educator licenses for substitute teaching

• Requires the State Board to establish new standards for obtaining an educator license for substitute teaching that require a post-secondary degree, but not in any specific subject area. (ORC 3319.226)

• Allows unlimited time in the classroom for substitutes with a post-secondary degree in education or a subject directly related to the subject area of the class. Allows a substitute to teach for one semester with a degree in an unrelated subject, and allows for longer periods upon approval by the school board. (ORC 3319.226)

Teaching outside of subject area or grade level

• Allows school districts to assign a teacher to a subject area for which the teacher is not licensed or to a grade level that is within two grades of the teacher’s licensure grade band for up to three years, if the teacher has at least three years of experience and passes a context exam. Allows the teacher to become fully licensed in the new teaching area or grade after one year if the teacher completes the pedagogy and instruction in teaching reading required for the new assignment. (ORC 3319.361)

Excessively absent students

• Specifies that when determining whether a student is “excessively absent” for the purposes of an absence intervention plan, a school district or school must consider only that student’s unexcused absences, rather than both excused and unexcused absences as under current law. (ORC 3321.191)

Special education preschool staffing

• Requires that a minimum of ten hours of services per week be provided for each disabled child served by a center-based teacher, unless otherwise specified in the child’s individualized education program. (ORC 3323.022)

Professional development for gifted services providers

• Requires the State Board to revise gifted operating standards so that a teacher designated as a gifted services provider must have at least 60 hours of gifted professional development over the first four years of the designation, except that an Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate teacher must have only 30 hours over that period. (Section 5)

Intervention Specialists

• Requires licenses for intervention specialists to specify the grade band (preK-5, 4-9, or 7-12) for which the teacher is licensed, but requires licenses for mild-moderate or moderate-intensive interventional specialists to be for grades K-12. (ORC 3319.2210)

Alternative Licenses for Career-Technical Education

• Requires the State Board to adopt rules establishing requirements for career-technical workforce development educator licenses for grades 4-12. Requires issuing an initial license to an employed applicant who has five years of work experience in the subject area and is enrolled in a career-technical education teacher prep program. Requires issuing an advanced license upon completion of the program and passage of a summative performance-based assessment. (ORC 3319.229)

Early College High Schools

• Creates a four-year, non-renewable provisional license to teach grades 7-12 in an Early College High School. Qualifies the teacher for a professional license upon completion of four years of teaching and passage of a pedagogy exam. (3319.262)

Highly Qualified Teachers

• Eliminates references in law to “highly qualified teachers.” (Various sections)

Ohio Teacher Evaluation System

• Requires the Department to revise the State Board’s state framework for teacher evaluations, based on the recommendations of the Educator Standards Board, and to submit a summary of its revisions to the State Board by May 1, 2019. Requires school districts to update their teacher evaluation policies by July 1, 2019. (ORC 3319.111 and 3319.112)

• Eliminates student academic growth as a specific percentage of the evaluation. (ORC 3319.112)

• Requires that the evaluation use “high-quality data,” as defined by the Department. (ORC 3319.112)

• Retains the option to evaluate “skilled” teachers every other year and “accomplished” teachers every third year, as long as the teachers have submitted a professional growth plan. (ORC 3319.111)

• Prohibits shared attribution and the use of student learning objectives. (3319.112)

• Directs the Department to do a pilot program for the 2018-2019 school year to test implementation of the revised framework. (Section 7)

Professional Development

• Requires use of professional development standards in developing professional growth plans. (ORC 3319.075)

College Credit Plus

• Lowers the secondary school’s share of textbook costs from 100% to 50%. Increases the student’s share of textbook costs from 0% to 50%, but requires the school to pay 100% of textbook costs for students with a family income up to 200% of the poverty level. (ORC 3365.072)

• Requires the Department to conduct a study on the results and cost-effectiveness of the College Credit Plus Program. (Section 3)

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