COLUMBUS, Ohio – Gov. Mike DeWine said Wednesday he supports an Ohio Senate bill that would overhaul the Ohio Department of Education, gut powers from the Ohio State Board of Education and give his office more oversight of education.
“I think virtually every governor for 40 or 50 years has wanted to have more control in regard to the Department of Education,” DeWine, a Republican, told reporters. “So this governor is not going to be different. You know, I support the bill.”
Senate Bill 178 would put the Ohio Department of Education under a cabinet-level official in the governor’s office and rename the agency the Department of Education and Workforce, which would be called by the acronym DEW. The cabinet official would oversee the department, a task currently held by the state school board. The department would have two divisions: one for primary and secondary education and one for workforce training.
The 19-member state school board, made up of 11 elected members and eight members appointed by the governor, would continue to exist, but it would be stripped of most of its duties. It would oversee educator licensing and select the superintendent of public instruction, who would be a secretary to the board and an advisor to the DEW leader in the governor’s office.
“Candidly, the bill was not our idea, but I support the bill,” DeWine said. “I think what the public expects is accountability. And it’s hard to have accountability under our current system. You know, having the Department of Education with kind of a joint control between the governor’s office and the governor on certain areas, and other areas be the state elected Board of Education, I think is a very significant improvement.”
The bill is under consideration in the Senate Primary and Secondary Education Committee. Ohio Senate President Matt Huffman, a Lima Republican, said committee hearings will likely continue Tuesday and probably Wednesday.
“I think we would like to pass that on Dec. 7,” Huffman said.
The committee’s chair, Sen. Andrew Brenner, a Delaware County Republican, said the new department would likely begin in 2025. Most of the Ohio Department of Education employees would work their same jobs at DEW, Brenner said, though the leader of DEW could make staffing changes.
Brenner said he’s frustrated with the Ohio State Board of Education because it is not holding the Education Department accountable. The state board has been beset with infighting. During many of the meetings, significant portions of time are spent arguing over parliamentary procedure.
Sometimes, when Brenner seeks data or information from the department, it doesn’t get back to him, he said.
Ohio hasn’t had a permanent superintendent of public instruction for nearly 15 months. The board hired Steve Dackin as superintendent last spring, eight days after learning about an ethics investigation involving him. Dackin ultimately had to resign as superintendent and forgo any salary he earned in the 11 days he was on the job in a settlement to avoid criminal prosecution for ethics law violations.
On Tuesday, proponents – who were mostly career and technical education schools – testified in favor of the bill.
Opponents are expected to testify next week.
Opponents have said the bill would politicize education at a time when some conservatives are trying to control how race is taught in social studies and whether schools should use a transgender student’s preferred names and pronouns, or out the students to their parents. Opponents said the bill would create a new bureaucracy without elected members who answer parents’ and local superintendents’ calls and questions.
Dublin City School District Superintendent John Marschhausen spoke in favor of the bill Tuesday. He said he had no issue with the employees of the department or state board of education.
“Over the past two decades, I’ve observed significant changes in how education leadership operates in Ohio,” he said. “While it may be easy to assign blame or complain about the current reality, what is required today is a new approach for Ohio’s public schools. The current system needs to be fixed; we need a clear vision and direction.”
Tim Ellenberger, founder and vice president of business development at Motion Controls Robotics in Sandusky County, said Tuesday that a division focused on workforce development is necessary as Ohio attracts more high-tech jobs.
“I am the poster child for workforce development or non-traditional education,” he said. “Having given The Ohio State University no choice but to not invite me back after a couple years, I went on to what was then Terra Technical College and received an associate’s degree. This was almost 40 years ago when four-year bachelors degrees were the only real, supported and accepted path of success. I thrived at the technical college where education was provided by professors who came from industry to education.”
Motion Controls now has 80 employees and millions of dollars of sales each year, making flexible automation robotic systems, he said.
Jeremy Pelzer contributed to this report.
Laura Hancock covers politics and policy in Columbus. Read more of her work here.