State reps. Adam Bird (left) and Josh Williams (right) are introducing a bill that would require public and private Ohio schools to have a minimum of 1,054 instructional hours per school year for grades 7 to 12. Ohio law currently requires a minimum of 1,001 hours. (Photo by Megan Henry, Ohio Capital Journal).
Republican lawmakers propose extending Ohio’s school year by 53 hours.
State Representatives Adam Bird, R-New Richmond, and Josh Williams, R-Sylvania, are introducing legislation that would require Ohio schools to provide at least 1,054 instructional hours per school year for grades 7 through 12. Ohio law currently mandates a minimum of 1,001 hours.
“Time in front of a teacher matters,” Bird said. “The more time students spend meaningful learning, the better they’re going to perform academically, the better that they’re going to perform socially, the better that they’re going to bring the soft skills to their employment later on in life,” Bird told the media during the conference.
The bill does not specify how schools must add the additional hours, leaving it up to each school or district to decide whether to extend the school day or the school year.
“We’re not going to tell school districts how to comply,” Williams stated at the press conference. “Simply extending the school day a little bit more, maybe one less field trip may be able to add to that instructional time or one less professional development day may be able to accomplish some of those hours.”
Instructional time refers to time spent in the classroom and excludes recess and lunch. Bird stated that the current law’s 1,001 hour requirement is equivalent to about 160 school days, and increasing the hours to 1,054 would be equivalent to about 180 school days.
“The intent of the bill is not to allow further slippage in the wrong direction,” Bird informed the crowd.
According to Bird, Ohio lags behind other states and countries in terms of required classroom instruction time. Kentucky requires 1,062 hours of instructional time per school year, while Michigan requires 1,098 hours, Wisconsin requires 1,050 hours, and Texas requires 1,260 hours. South Korea requires 1,300 hours, he stated.
“It’s really important for Ohio to remain competitive on the world stage,” Bird told the crowd. “We want to attract the world’s Intels. “We must be prepared to produce a workforce.”
The lawmakers also cited students’ learning loss during COVID-19 as a reason for the bill.
“The student regression that occurred during COVID has never been made up,” said Bird, who served as a middle school principal during the pandemic. “Students have never yet recovered from that and our students have not made up for that decline.”
A new law that takes effect in April will require school districts to have a religious release time policy in place during the school day.
“We continue to move down this path of allowing additional release time, not only for that, but for 4-H experiences and a wide variety of things that are valid, whether it’s field trips, college visits, we’re allowing all of those things to happen, and we continue to have an issue when it comes to truancy, habitual chronic absenteeism in schools,” Bird told the crowd.
According to the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, the state’s chronic absenteeism rate, which is defined as missing 10% of the school year, was 25.6% in 2023-2024.
“If a student is missing 10% of the school year — and that’s a problem — well, I’d rather them miss 10% of 180 days than miss 10% of 160 days,” Bird told reporters.
He expects that parents will support this bill.
“They want their child to get the best education that they can get,” Bird told me. “Parents understand that time in school is imperative to a student receiving the best education that they can get.”
Neither lawmaker knew how many Ohio school districts already provide 1,054 hours of instructional time.
Ohio teacher unions are concerned about the bill.
“Ohio Education Association is concerned by any proposal to create another large unfunded mandate on Ohio’s public schools, especially when many Ohio districts face a large decrease in state funding in the state budget,” Scott DiMauro, president of OEA, said.
Melissa Cropper, president of the Ohio Federation of Teachers, stated that adding hours does not guarantee more instructional time or better outcomes.
“Instead of arbitrarily adding time, the state needs to focus on eliminating unnecessary work that detracts from student instructional time and does nothing to improve student outcomes,” she told me.
