Ohio Governor Mike DeWine signed House Bill 8, also known as “The Parents Bill of Rights” this past January.

The bill was originally drafted as a simple reconstruction of parental access to students’ daily attendance. However, over the course of the legislative drafting process, the bill became a lot more polarizing.

In its final form, the bill provides parental access to their child’s sexuality content in class, information privately disclosed to counselors, in-school health care and greater knowledge of all educational records.

Some advocates of the bill believe that it does not add much new to the school system that schools were not already doing.

At Granville High School, they may be correct. Principal Scott Hinton believes that the bill has not changed much here.

“There hasn’t been anything that has come across my desk that has necessarily been changed by Bill 8,” Hinton said.

Despite this, some groups are having trouble finding positive benefits from the bill.

The Ohio Education Association, the largest educational union in the state of Ohio, is not supportive of the bill.

“[We] oppose the bill as HB8 unnecessarily entangles state government in regulating communications and relationships between parents and educators,” the OEA released this January.

“Government mandates on these matters interfere with the professionalism of educators and weaken the principles of local control of public schools. OEA is concerned that amendments to House Bill 8 target LGBTQ+ students and staff.”

Their concerns pertain to the part of the bill related to counselor disclosure. The language in the bill is a little vague, they argue.

“The policy shall prohibit school district personnel from discouraging or prohibiting parental notification of and involvement in decisions affecting a student’s mental emotional well-being,” the bill states.

The bill requires counselors to communicate everything they hear from their students, including possible conversations around personal identity. However, Principal Hinton believes that this will not effect GHS as much as people think.

“We have always tried to create a network that promotes communication between parents and students when it comes to [sensitive topics discussed with counselors],” Hinton said. “For better or worse, this will probably just speed up the process.”

As Granville High School enters the second month of the academic year, the bill’s impact seems to be minimal. However, Hinton knows from experience that the bill’s impact on Granville will evolve.

“We’ll just have to wait and see,” Hinton said.