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While the 2026 legislative session started early and has been dominated by the state’s redistricting debate, the rest of the session could bring big changes to Indiana schools and students.
As part of our coverage, Chalkbeat Indiana is tracking this year’s biggest education bills as they move through the statehouse.
Below are bills that would make substantial changes to policies affecting Indiana students and teachers. That means generally, we’re not including bills that make minor changes to existing grants and programs, or to the makeup of state commissions and governing bodies.
This page will be updated weekly on Fridays throughout the session. A full list of bills is available on the General Assembly website. Some of the bill descriptions below come from the General Assembly.
More information about how a bill becomes a law is available here. You can also find more information on the two education committees here.
This year is a short session, and because of the early start, lawmakers expect to complete their work by the end of February. Bills must pass out of their originating chamber by Jan. 29 to continue to advance in the other chamber, per the Indiana General Assembly website.
Education bills in the Indiana House
House lawmakers have until Jan. 7 to file bills.
HB 1004: Education matters
A massive deregulation bill repealing 40 provisions in education and higher education and making changes to 15 more topics, including powers of the governing bodies of school corporations and public-private agreements by charter schools for the construction or renovation of schools.
HB 1017: University notification of emergency contact
Requires universities to establish a procedure where a student may designate an emergency contact for medical emergencies, and to notify the contact in the event of an emergency.
HB 1018: School age child care
Removes transportation requirements in the approval criteria for the school age child care project fund
HB 1026: Child care funding
Requires the state to use a $300 million Financial Growth and Opportunity fund from the 2025 budget to fund the Childcare Development Fund and the On My Way Pre-K programs, which have recently faced cuts.
HB 1034: Student cellular telephone use
Bans cellphones, personal laptops, smartwatches, and other devices from schools for the full school day and specifies that any learning on devices must be done on school-issued devices. Read more here.
HB 1035: Permissible unsupervised activity
Specifies that a child does not need Department of Child Services intervention for engaging in independent activities like staying home or in a car alone, or playing or biking outside, unless a parent has endangered the child’s safety by allowing them to do the activity, based on the child’s “maturity, condition, or ability.”
HB 1059: Commercial advertising on a school bus
Allows a school district to display commercial ads on its buses, with some restrictions.
HB 1071: 21st Century Scholarship eligibility
Exempts students with disabilities from needing to be enrolled full time in order to qualify for the 21st Century Scholarship.
HB 1086: Ten Commandments
Requires public school districts to display the Ten Commandments in each classroom and library.
HB 1093: Student bullying
Adds actions by a school staff member to the definition of bullying and requires schools to track bullying incidents in order to identify bullying types, flag students who might be at risk of bullying, and implement interventions to stop bullying.
HB 1102: Applied behavioral analysis
Requires schools to allow applied behavioral analysis providers to give services to a student in a public school as outlined by the student’s Individualized Education Program.
HB 1107: Bullying oversight committees and ombudsman
Creates a state bullying ombudsman within the Department of Education and requires every school district to establish a bullying oversight committee.
HB 1124: Testing drinking water for lead in school buildings
Requires school districts to test water for lead and includes civil penalties for failing to do so.
HB 1136: Tuition caps
Places tuition caps at University of Southern Indiana and Ball State, Indiana, and Purdue universities for Indiana residents.
HB 1137: Ultraprocessed food and beverages
Bans food that includes certain food dyes and additives from schools. Requires schools to post a menu and ingredients online.
HB 1149 Pre-K tax credit
Establishes an early-childhood scholarship tax credit for contributions made to a scholarship-granting organization. Requires school districts that operate an early learning center to open the program to families living outside the school district.
HB 1154: Hunger-free campus grant program
Provide grants to state educational institutions for purposes of addressing food insecurity among students.
HB 1158: Personal outcomes
Requires public schools to teach the positive outcomes of obtaining a high school diploma, getting a job, and waiting until marriage to have children.
HB 1159: Pre-K vision screening
Requires school districts to conduct vision screenings for preschool-aged children.
HB 1160: Citizenship exam for eighth grade and high school
Requires schools to administer the naturalization examination in eighth grade and high school and makes passing it with a score of 70% a graduation requirement.
HB 1170: Teacher compensation
Raises minimum teacher salaries to $60,000 beginning in fiscal year 2028.
HB 1176: Education matters
- Gives school districts more leeway to convert schools to charter schools but prohibits them from acting as both an authorizer and an innovation network partner to a school.
- Provides that money remaining in the Indiana Education Scholarship Account program fund and Career Scholarship Account program fund does not revert to the state general fund.
- Requires parental notification if a school determines a student is at risk of not achieving grade level proficiency in mathematics.
HB 1232: Schools, funding and religion
Requires a public school to teach the Bible as literature in every grade level of K-12, including age-appropriate instruction on the history of Israel; the moral and ethical teachings of the Old and New Testaments; the life of Jesus; the history of the early Christian church; and the Bible’s influence on Western civilization. Prohibits a school from teaching the Bible as religious dogma or divinely inspired.
HB 1242: School corporation report
Requires the Department of Education to prepare a report compiling statewide data on school corporations, including the total number of school corporations in Indiana disaggregated by county population, the number of school corporations per county, the number of students enrolled in each school, as well as recommendations to increase school corporation administrative efficiencies and reduce school corporation administrative costs.
HB 1266: Education matters
Creates a new qualification option for a transition to teaching program participant who seeks to obtain a license to teach in grades 5-12 and joins the interstate teacher mobility compact. Requires the Department of Education to:
- Create a list of employers that have agreed to provide career support for or interview Indiana residents who graduate with an Indiana diploma with an Employment Honors Plus seal.
- Create a teaching and learning framework for the implementation of mathematics academic standards.
- Develop a data science math pathway.
- Develop strategies to support academic and fiscally underperforming schools, and a plan to intervene.
HB 1289: State and local administration
Limits collective bargaining with school bus drivers to the topics allowed in collective bargaining with teachers.
HB 1313: Education matters
Prohibits public schools, excluding charter schools, from hiring lobbyists. Prohibits a school employer from deducting union dues. Prohibits a school district from converting a scheduled instructional day to virtual instruction because of the planned or coordinated absence of teachers or other personnel for the purpose of participating in a protest.
HB 1325: Behavioral intervention and special education
Requires the Department of Education to make recommendations on behavioral intervention services for children and special education.
HB 1388: Initial practitioner license
Waives the pedagogy exam for graduates of a teacher preparation program, unless the individual fails to obtain a teaching license within three years of graduation.
HB 1408: Education matters — Ivy Tech
Adds requirements for the governance of Ivy Tech Community College.
HB 1418: Teacher licensing requirements
Exempts teacher candidates from a content exam if they are seeking a PE, music, or art license for any grade, or an English language arts, math, or health license in grades 7-12.
HB 1423: Indianapolis Public Education Corporation
Establishes the Indianapolis Public Education Corporation to oversee district and charter schools in Indianapolis. Read more here.
Status: To be heard Monday, Jan. 12 in the House Education Committee.
Education bills in the Indiana Senate
Senate lawmakers have until Jan. 9 to file bills.
SB 15: Foster youth Bill of Rights
Requires the department of child services to create, publish, and distribute a statement called “the foster youth bill of rights” which summarizes a foster youth’s rights and responsibilities.
SB 58: Cursive writing
Requires elementary schools to teach cursive.
SB 62: Unlawful possession of a firearm by a child
Makes changes to laws concerning firearm possession by a child, including adding an enhanced penalty if an offense was committed on or in school property, within 500 feet of school property, or on a school bus.
SB 66: Kindergarten readiness indicators
Requires the early learning advisory committee to establish and publish kindergarten readiness indicators concerning behavior, executive functioning, literacy, math, and others.
SB 68: Accelerated graduate degree programs
Requires colleges and universities to add graduate degree programs in fields like social work and counseling, and to allow students to complete them on an accelerated timeline.
SB 77: Sale of school buildings
Creates exceptions to the $1 law for school districts in a county with a population of less than 150,000 to have one year to sell a school building to a county or municipal government before the school building must be made available for lease or purchase to a charter school or state educational institution for $1. Read more here.
SB 78: Wireless communication device policy
Bans cellphones, personal laptops, smartwatches, and other devices from schools for the full school day and specifies that any learning on devices must be done on school-issued devices. Read more here.
SB 84: Prekindergarten and child care
A sweeping child care and preschool bill that seeks to expands the income eligibility for the programs, raise reimbursement rates for providers, and fully fund applicants to the child care fund in order to eliminate the waitlist. Read more here.
SB 86: Charter schools
- Removes the charter board, state educational institutions, and nonprofit college or university governing boards from the definition of an authorizer.
- After June 30, 2026, provides that the charter board, state educational institutions, and governing boards may not issue new charters or renew existing charters.
- After June 30, 2026, establishes a five year moratorium that prohibits an authorizer from granting a charter to an organizer to establish and operate a charter school in Indiana.
- Requires charter schools to provide transportation services to all students who reside within the public school district within which the charter school is located.
- Exempts school corporations subject to certain property tax sharing requirements from the dollar law.
- Changes the maximum charter school contract term to five years.
SB 88: Identity instruction and teacher licensing exemptions
- Requires public schools to incorporate the importance of: (1) obtaining at least a high school diploma and acquiring additional training in preparation for the workforce; (2) securing full-time employment; and (3) waiting until marriage to begin having children; into student instruction.
- Prohibits social studies instruction or discussion from teaching a national identity that’s based on racism, sexism, gender discrimination, victimization, class struggle, privilege, or exclusion.
- Requires a state educational institution to accept a Classic Learning Test score for admission consideration.
- Allows teacher candidates in alternative pathways to request a waiver from the state teacher licensing exam and substitute their ACT, SAT, Classical Learning Test, or GRE scores instead.
SB 110: Indiana University Board of Trustees
Requires three members of the Indiana University Board of Trustees to be elected Indiana University alumni.
SB 123: Student water safety
Requires public schools, including charter schools, to present an informational video on water safety to K-12 students.
SB 124: Age for compulsory school attendance
Lowers the mandatory school age from 7 to 5.
SB 129: Social media access
Requires social media operators to obtain parental consent for minor users to view social media.
SB 138: School chaplains
Allows chaplains to volunteer or work in schools, providing secular advice, or nonsecular advice if the parent of a student gives permission.
SB 159: School technology plans
Requires a school to include a provision in the school’s Internet use policy to enable the parent of a student to increase the strength of content filters and limit the use of devices. Requires these plans to include a provision banning students from using devices for noneducational purposes during instructional time.
SB 161: Education matters — federal tax credit and higher education
Requires the Indiana Department of Education to participate in the new federal tax credit scholarship. Bans the Commission on Higher Education from funding low earning degree programs. Provides that the department of workforce development must maintain alignment with federal rules governing workforce Pell grants
SB 199: Education matters — social media
Prohibits social media operators from allowing Indiana children under 14 from making accounts, and places restrictions on teenagers’ accounts.
SB 200: Education matters — contracts
Requires schools to allow organizers like military recruiters and career organizations to talk to students twice per year. Prohibits schools from signing contracts that include indemnity or choice of laws clauses.
SB 204: Education matters
- Removes a requirement that department of education approved accreditors for teacher preparation programs be recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.
- Provides that an individual who has obtained a license to teach in a charter school may be eligible to obtain an initial practitioner license under certain conditions.
- Removes a requirement that an individual must hold a bachelor’s degree in science, technology, engineering, or mathematics as a component of certain pathways to receive an initial practitioner license.
- Provides that academic needs based salary increases may not apply to all eligible teachers in a bargaining unit uniformly or be based on certain other factors like experience.
SB 239: Education matters
Allows a school district to convert schools into charter schools but bars the district from serving as the authorizer. Allows districts to operate two or more conversion charters on a single charter.
SB 248: South Bend schools
Provides that members of the governing body for the South Bend Community School Corporation shall become an advisory board to a new governing body for the school corporation. Members of the governing body for the school corporation shall be appointed by the Indiana secretary of education following a nomination process.
SB 254: Ivy Tech
Changes and expands the duties and governance of Ivy Tech Community College.
Aleksandra Appleton covers Indiana education policy and writes about K-12 schools across the state. Contact her at aappleton@chalkbeat.org.
