A bill to create the Arkansas ACCESS Act has advanced through the state’s legislature and could become law as early as this week. In 123 pages, the bill aims to overhaul the state’s approach to higher education.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Sanders is championing the legislation. She teased her plan for the bill in her State of the State Address in January and promoted it with sponsors in February.
“For far too long we’ve told a lie that the only way to be successful is to graduate college with a four-year degree straight out of high school. When I sign ACCESS, we will tell Arkansans the truth: everyone is unique and everyone’s education journey should be too.”
Sanders said the bill addresses issues with higher education paths being “too complicated, too woke,” and not preparing students for future careers.
Background
“ACCESS” stands for acceleration, common sense, cost, eligibility, scholarships, and standardization. It follows in the footsteps of Arkansas LEARNS, Sanders’ landmark education bill that swept through the legislative process in 2023. While LEARNS focused on K-12 education, ACCESS is marketed as a higher education reform.
It’s advanced through the legislature as two companion bills, SB246 and HB1512, both sponsored by Sen. Jonathan Dismang of Searcy and Rep. Matthew Shepherd of El Dorado. The two Republicans focus on sections that increase award amounts for scholarships, incentivize skills-based learning, and make college admissions easier to navigate while promoting their bill. They say these reforms are a needed overhaul of the state’s higher education system.
Dismang, Shepherd, and Education Secretary Jacob Oliva joined Sanders to promote the bill in February. There, Dismang said ACCESS will “eliminate the status quo” in higher education.
“We’re going to be looking and increasing the opportunities that [students] have before them, and then we’re going to be maximizing their outcomes so they can be as successful as they can possibly be”
Student Rights
Several controversial sections of ACCESS led to hours of discussion at a joint meeting of the House and Senate Education committees last Monday. Dozens of Arkansans came to speak against the bill at what is likely to have been the only chance for public comment on the legislation. The majority of testimony came from high school and college students addressing a section that could stifle students’ ability to engage in civic action.
Section 23 would prohibit public and open-enrollment charter high schools from granting excused absences to students who miss class to attend a political protest or a walkout of some kind. Little Rock Central High School Junior Mira Crane urged lawmakers to reject the section, saying it violates student rights and endangers their education.
“Walkouts and protests are a way for me to stand behind my beliefs and learn about politics and civil action. They are not a disruption to my education, they are a part of it.”
Crane said students walk out for serious issues to make a difference and to make their voices heard. She added lawmakers don’t have a right to dictate what students can and can’t advocate for.
Crane noted, in her experience as a Jewish student, it’s already difficult to get excused absences for religious holidays that aren’t on the calendar approved by public schools. Codifying this language, she said, would force her to choose between her education and her beliefs.
At the same meeting, Shepherd defended Section 23 as a means of ensuring students spend enough time in the classroom.
“We want our students in school to learn,” he said. “They are there to get an education and they are not there to have a teacher push them into some type of advocacy or political protest.”
The committee recessed soon after Crane spoke for lawmakers to meet in the House and Senate chambers for the afternoon. When they returned a few hours later, Dismang and Shepherd introduced an amendment that would allow high school students to miss class for advocacy work if their parents provide written permission to the school, but protests and walkouts would still be unexcused. Schools would have to track the number of students who take excused absences for these reasons and send a report to the State Board of Education each year.
The amendment did not change language in Section 47, which includes the same language but in regards to students at state-supported colleges and universities. Section 47 also strengthens the ability of a college to shut down protests or punish students reported to be interfering with the educational environment. This comes after Republican leaders including Gov. Sanders condemned student protests against Israel’s war on Palestine. Many such protests took place on university campuses, including the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.
Section 48 could also drastically change how faculty and administrators conduct themselves. The section, titled “Rejecting discrimination and indoctrination in post-secondary education” effectively cuts any remaining diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in state-funded higher education. According to the bill, any program that "promotes preferences or differential treatment" among students must be dissolved or the institution could lose state funding.
The section is further strengthened after a bill to ban affirmative action and DEI programs in state agencies was signed into law earlier in the session. Arkansas LEARNS also touches on “indoctrination” and critical race theory, though that part of the law has been blocked by the courts.
Section 48 also extends to how college professors teach their classes. ACCESS says educators should teach students “how to think, not what to think,” meaning anything that could be interpreted as compelling students to adopt or affirm a certain belief is prohibited.
One example specifically forbidden in the bill is telling students someone who is of a certain race, ethnicity, or sex is inherently responsible for actions committed by other members of the same race, ethnicity, or sex.
Tenure protections
Current law provides tenured faculty members with protections against being demoted to a non-tenured position. Tenured professors have to go through an annual review with their employers but the law says that review can’t be used to remove their tenure.
Section 60 of ACCESS strikes that protection and gives universities permission to strip professors of tenure under certain conditions, including violating a policy of the university or engaging in “unprofessional conduct.” It also codifies language to allow the university to do an immediate review of a professor if deemed necessary. A professor who is stripped of tenure would still be allowed to appeal the decision.
Tenure is traditionally seen as a protection for academic freedom and allowing professors to teach controversial topics without fear of repercussions. But it also has the potential to be misused.
A recent case at the University of Central Arkansas in Conway brought one example of this to light. A professor, Mark Bland, announced his retirement last fall and was given off-campus assignments for his last semester following accusations of misconduct with students. Despite the accusations, Bland reportedly retired with full benefits and without visible consequences.
The new provisions in ACCESS could give universities the ability to levy more significant actions in response to cases like at UCA. But opponents of the bill worry this section could have a chilling effect on how professors conduct their classes and might lead to self-censorship. Like LEARNS, this could also be stopped in the courts.
Accelerated Learning
Section 5 of ACCESS defines and emphasizes accelerated learning programs. Accelerated learning means any kind of curriculum that allows a student to meet state learning standards while also receiving credit towards a higher education degree. It includes things like Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate, concurrent classes, and similar programs approved by the state.
Putting all these programs under one definition intends to equalize how the courses are weighted for a high school grade point average. Currently, AP classes are weighted higher than regular classes, creating situations where a student who takes AP classes and receives high marks would have a higher GPA than a student who gets the same grades in a non-AP class. Because GPAs factor into college admissions and scholarship eligibility, it incentivizes students to take AP classes.
Education Secretary Jacob Oliva said including concurrent classes in this definition would encourage more students to take advantage of dual-credit programs and scholarships.
Section 91 of ACCESS creates the ACCESS to Acceleration Scholarship program to allow students to take the courses for free, up to 15 credit hours per semester, 30 credits per year.
Members of the public voiced concern Section 5 would remove funding and incentives for AP courses–the standard path to get college credit while still in high school. While the term “Advanced Placement” is replaced by “accelerated learning” throughout the bill, the courses are not directly cut.
It could have an indirect effect in situations where multiple students in a school district choose to enroll in concurrent courses instead of the AP classes offered at their school and the district decides to fill their accelerated learning course requirement with only concurrent classes, but it’s also possible students could enroll in a concurrent course in addition to taking AP courses.
Reactions
Sponsors are focusing on the positives of ACCESS, while opponents are presenting laundry-lists of concerns.
Rep. Lincoln Barnett, D-Forrest City, spoke against the bill on the House floor last Thursday, saying the legislation is too comprehensive and “sneaks in the bad along with the good.”
Barnett said he was also opposed to the bill for the manner in which it was run. He accused fellow lawmakers of ignoring or only half-listening to concerns from students and educators who would be impacted by ACCESS.
“These bills deserve more time, more input, and it should result in more amendments that could help improve the bill.” Barnett said, adding he did not expect his speech to change lawmakers’ minds. “Just know your vote will not go unnoticed.”
ACCESS was filed at the end of the business day on February 17. In response to criticisms about the timeline, Shepherd and Dismang have said they’re not rushing the process, noting it has been available for the public and stakeholders to review for three weeks before coming into committee.
Because ACCESS is running as a pair of companion bills, only one of these pieces of legislation needs to pass both legislative chambers before heading to the Governor’s desk. Both the House and Senate bills advanced through their original chambers on party-line votes – in the Senate, Republican Bryan King abstained, and in the House, Republicans DeAnn Vaught and Matt Duffield also did not vote.
House lawmakers approved the Senate version of the bill Monday afternoon. It now heads to the governor's desk.
