On November 11, the Ohio State Board of Education will vote on a motion to eliminate crucial positions at elementary schools.

The Board will vote on whether to eliminate “specialist” positions, that include elementary schools arts teachers, elementary school music teachers, elementary school physical education teachers, school nurses, school library media specialists, school counselors, and school social workers.

Will they call it “reform”?

Here is Peter Greene, reporting on the same horrifying spectacle, with more detail.

He writes:

This morning comes word that the Ohio State Board of Education will vote this Tuesday on some revision to the school code. The most significant revision reportedly under consideration is one that would make end state requirements for elementary specialists.

Currently, school code states that for every thousand elementary students, schools must have in place five of the following eight specialists: art, music, counselor, school nurse, librarian/media specialist, visiting teacher, social worker, or phys ed.

The revision would eliminate the section that includes that language. What would be left is this definition of staff:

Educational service personnel are credentialed staff with the knowledge, skills and expertise to support the educational, instructional, health, mental health, and college/career readiness needs of students.

The appeal for districts is obvious. Let’s have one music teacher for 10,000 students. Let’s have no music teacher at all. Great. Let me mention that this article also came across my screen this morning: “Youngstown kids second poorest in nation” Do we really need to argue that the poorest, most vulnerable students are the ones who most need these sorts of services and enrichment? Is there somebody in Ohio prepared, seriously, to argue that nurses and music and art and phys ed are unnecessary luxuries, and kids should just pack up their grit and do without?

The Twitter hashtag for this abomination is #ohio5of8