A school discipline bill that could result in the automatic suspension of grade school children sailed through the Senate Education Committee Tuesday, despite calls to pump the brakes from one long-serving lawmaker and a representative from the county with the state’s largest enrollment.
The bill is part of an effort to address discipline concerns in elementary schools, after the Legislature passed a sweeping bill last year that allowed teachers more discretion to suspend students in middle and high schools.
SB 614 — crafted by committee chair Sen. Amy Grady, R-Mason — would give teachers in kindergarten through sixth grade the power to remove children exhibiting violence, threatening or intimidating others from the classroom and place them into alternative learning settings. Students would not be allowed to ride the bus and a parent must pick them up — if a parent is unable to, the school will call the police.
Grady, who last week said a similar bill that passed the House was too broad, said her bill is clearer because it excludes disruption as grounds for removal from the classroom.
During Tuesday’s meeting, Lindsey McIntosh, general counsel for Kanawha County Public Schools, told the committee the bill was too vague and left too much discretion to teachers, in part because terms like “violence, intimidation and threats” were not defined.
“How will a child be treated if they’re fighting over a pepperoni roll and they say, ‘I’ll kill you’ to another child?” McIntosh said. “Under this, that could cause a suspension.”
Under the current system, McIntosh said there are a variety of discipline options that teachers and administrators can use before suspending a child. And the way the bill is written, it would largely cut principals out of the equation.
But Grady, who is a grade school teacher herself, said she’s heard from many teachers who feel unsupported by the administration.
“A lot of the comments have been that ‘my principal feels like we can love these kids so much that it’s going to change their behavior,’” Grady said. “God bless them for that because that’s what we try to do. But in reality, we can’t.
Grady said removing the one problem child from the classroom can help the other 19 or 20 kids in the classroom be able to learn in a safe environment.
Prior to advancing the bill out of committee, Sen. Charles Trump, R-Morgan, moved to have the bill set aside for a day to work out some of the language but the committee overruled him. When it came up for a vote, Trump voted against the bill itself.
“I’m not against the general idea of this bill, which is to remove disruptive students from classrooms, but I think we need to be careful with how we do it,” he said. “I hope we can keep having conversations about this as it moves forward.”
State officials have been trying to reduce the number of suspensions, but have found a school discipline law passed last year overly broad and leaving a lot up to interpretation on the part of teachers.
Fred Albert, president of the West Virginia American Federation of Teachers, said he’s glad to see the issue being addressed.
“We need help, our teachers need help, our students need help,” he said. “I think this is a good start.”
Correction: An earlier version of this article misquoted Sen. Grady’s comments during Tuesday’s committee meeting. It has been updated.
