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Committee adopts amendment to allow single-occupancy sleeping quarters on overnight school trips

Education Committee - Senate · March 8, 2023
AI-Generated Content: All content on this page was generated by AI to highlight key points from the meeting. For complete details and context, we recommend watching the full video. so we can fix them.

Summary

The Senate Education Committee adopted an amendment to House Bill 1156 to allow students single-occupancy sleeping quarters on overnight school trips. Supporters said superintendents requested the change for student safety; opponents and witnesses raised research and equity concerns for transgender students and questioned facility feasibility.

The Senate Education Committee on Wednesday adopted an amendment to House Bill 1156 that clarifies students on school overnight trips may, when necessary, be provided single-occupancy sleeping quarters.

State Representative Mary Bentley, who presented the amendment on behalf of Senator Jimmy Hickey, said the change simply "provides for single occupancy sleeping quarters for a student on an overnight trip" and reflected requests from Arkansas superintendents. She told the committee the amendment makes clear a student "can share sleeping quarters with a member of the same [sex] if necessary, multiple members, or it's provided a single occupancy…

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