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Utah House approves measure adding mental-health absences to excused reasons for students
Summary
The House passed a bill to add mental or behavioral health to the list of reasons parents may excuse a student from school; sponsors said schools record only excused/unexcused, not diagnoses, and cited NAMI Utah and youth suicide concerns. The bill will be sent to the Senate.
The Utah House passed legislation to explicitly add mental and behavioral health to the list of reasons a parent may excuse a child from school.
Representative Winder, sponsor of House Bill 81, said the change clarifies state code and leaves recording practices with school counselors, who mark absences as "excused" or "unexcused" without noting medical diagnoses. "They said when somebody calls us... they have 2 options. They can list it as an excused absence or an unexcused. They don't list the reason why," Winder said, arguing the bill returns discretion to parents.
Members questioned whether the change would create a record of students' mental-health conditions. Representative Lyman asked whether parents would have to give a reason and whether it would appear on school records; Winder replied that districts currently vary and that the bill would not require schools to record diagnostic details.
The sponsor said the measure was brought by NAMI Utah and other organizations and cited Utah's high youth suicide rate as a rationale for the change. "NAMI Utah, which, seeing that Utah is the sixth highest youth suicide rate in the country, views this as a very important... step to take," the sponsor said.
The House voted to transmit the bill to the Senate for further consideration. The transcript does not include a roll-call tally for House Bill 81 in the portions provided.
