A legislative study committee convened virtually to begin reviewing Title 20 of the Georgia Code, the state’s education statutes, focusing on standardizing school terminology, clarifying waiver authority and identifying statutory provisions that impose administrative burdens on teachers and administrators.

The committee’s chair, Representative Chris Irwin, opened the meeting and asked members to help “take a serious look at this code section 20,” saying the group should consider removing obsolete provisions and “cleaning up” language that has become burdensome for local schools.

The meeting drew staff from the Georgia Department of Education, legislative counsel and representatives of school associations. Matt Cardoza, director of external affairs at the Georgia Department of Education, speaking on behalf of State School Superintendent Richard Woods, said the department shares the committee’s goal of reducing paperwork so educators can focus on instruction. “Superintendent Woods has had this mantra for a long time — compassion over compliance,” Cardoza said, adding that waivers have been used in events such as COVID and hurricanes to ease local burdens.

Michael Walker, deputy legislative counsel, told the committee the code uses inconsistent terms—“local units of administration,” “local education agencies,” and the generic “public school”—and that standardizing terminology would make statute clearer. Walker also summarized the recent history of waivers: the state adopted broad waiver authority in the late 2000s and since then the legislature has sometimes narrowed waiver applicability when enacting new laws. “At this point, I think it’s safe to say that school systems and school administrators may have less than a perfectly clear picture as to what waivers they might be eligible for,” Walker said. He added the office has counted “15 under our belt with waivers” and cautioned the committee about constitutional limits on “multiple-subject” bills if the group proposes a wide-ranging cleanup measure.

Committee members and outside groups proposed targeted, practical next steps rather than a wholesale rewrite. Gail Wiggins offered to convene panels of roughly 10 representative principals (large, medium and small; urban and rural) to surface the mandates that most impede local leadership. A representative of the Georgia School Boards Association said staff could run member surveys and provide policy-research support. Margaret (surname not specified in the transcript) said she will distribute a brief survey to administrators at a large summer conference, and Courtney George (legislative analyst) will support staff planning and meeting logistics.

Members discussed narrowing the committee’s initial focus to a small set of priorities rather than attempting to open all of Title 20 at once. Irwin recommended concentrating on a short list of topics — noting “3 things that we can narrow in” as an initial approach — and several members endorsed that narrower approach to improve the odds of producing usable recommendations.

The committee tentatively scheduled an in-person meeting for Aug. 26 in Houston County and said it would convene additional site visits across the state to gather local perspectives. No formal motions or votes were recorded at the kickoff meeting.

Why it matters: Title 20 contains the state’s core education laws and a large body of procedural requirements and program rules. Committee members said clarifying which school entities are covered by which rules, making waiver processes transparent, and removing obsolete mandates could reduce administrative work for local school staff and free teacher time for instruction.

The committee will meet again to set a narrower set of priorities, gather feedback from principals and administrators statewide and discuss potential statutory language. The group did not adopt any formal legislation at the kickoff meeting.