Iowa House Representative for District 23 Ray Sorensen says that the House is working on finalizing the bills remaining that need approval.

He tells Raccoon Valley Radio that along with a few budget bills, the House’s parent empowerment bill is also being finished up, but with a few things being stricken from it.

“The House had a number of other education policies in our original version of this bill, such as forms to the BoEE, the Board of Education Examiners, and creating additional paths to teacher licensure. So those pieces didn’t make it, unfortunately. But the bill, I think, is heading to the governor’s desk.”

Sorensen adds that the bill ensures age appropriate books in school, prohibits curriculum on gender identity or sexual orientation in kindergarten through 6th grade and requires schools to get parental consent before conducting surveys, sharing where the surveys came from, who their sponsored by and what will be done with the data.

He mentions that it also prevents schools from having policies that would keep a child’s gender identity a secret from their parents. Sorensen says this part of the bill makes it very clear that if a child asks for accommodations based on their gender identity being different from their sex at birth, the teacher must inform administration, and administration must tell the child’s parents.