Despite the massive public opposition to Senate Bill 83, a small group of legislators is still trying to advance this bill. We are asking our members and allies to fight back once again and encourage the House of Representatives to reject SB 83! Please use this form to contact House members.

Background
SB 83 had passed the Ohio Senate but has not had sufficient support in the House Higher Education Committee to advance. The Senate inserted SB 83's language into the state budget bill, but it was ultimately removed by the budget conference committee, again because it didn't have the necessary support in the House of Representatives.

SB 83 sponsor, Sen. Jerry Cirino, is attempting to work with House Higher Education Committee Chairman, Rep. Tom Young, to push the bill over the finish line.

The pending ("-11) version of SB 83 in the House still prohibits faculty from bargaining over certain subjects--tenure, retrenchment, workload, and evaluations. The true intent of this portion of SB 83 is to weaken the power of faculty to advocate for fair working conditions, which are students' learning conditions.

SB 83 remains a sweeping piece of legislation that proposes an unprecedented level of political interference and micromanagement into the affairs of Ohio's public colleges and universities.

Throughout its multiple iterations, the bill has been a series of contradictions on freedom of speech, claiming to promote intellectual diversity while simultaneously dictating the manner in which certain topics can be discussed and eliminating other topics from any discussion. It would ban institutions from requiring the types of trainings that ensure all students, no matter their backgrounds, can succeed.

The untenable mandates in SB 83 would shift money, time, and attention from student learning to bloated bureaucracy. It would make it harder to attract students and faculty to Ohio institutions; in the long run, Ohio will become even less competitive economically. This bill would exacerbate "brain drain!"

None of this enhances higher education. Instead, this is a bill deeply rooted in Culture-War ideology. In an effort to score political points, the legislature could do real, irreversible damage to our institutions of higher education. WE MUST STOP SB 83! Use this form to email State Representatives to ask them to reject SB 83.