A Uniform Public School Registration Process

Senate Bill 82(S) is a simple bill that garnered some surprise and incomprehensible opposition from 6 of the 7 Senate Republicans when the Senate considered this bill earlier in June. But then the bill sailed through the House unanimously at the end of June, so go figure.

The bill codifies the Department of Education’s current efforts to establish a uniform public school registration process and requires that, beginning with the 2023 through 2024 school year, all public schools shall use the uniform public school registration process.

This registration process will simplify the process for families, enable public schools to engage with families and plan in advance of the school year, and integrate data systems to eliminate duplication of effort. The bill requires the uniform public school registration process to be Internet-based and in paper form and in English and Spanish.

Senate Bill 82(S) Sponsors	Yes Votes	No Votes
Lockman, Ennis, Gay, Pinkney, Poore, Wilson	Senate Passed 14-6. Brown Ennis Gay Hansen Lockman Mantzavinos Paradee Pinkney Poore S.McBride Sokola Sturgeon Townsend Walsh Bonini	Hocker Lawson Lopez Pettyjohn Richardson Wilson
Minor-Brown, K.Williams, Baumbach, Heffernan, K.Johnson, Lambert, S.Moore, Morris, Shupe	House Passed 41-0. Baumbach Bennett Bentz Bolden Brady Bush Carson Chukwuocha Cooke Dorsey-Walker Griffith Heffernan K.Johnson K.Williams Kowalko Lambert Longhurst Lynn Matthews Minor-Brown Mitchell Morrison Osienski S.Moore Schwartzkopf Wilson-Anton Briggs King Collins D.Short Dukes Gray Hensley M.Smith Morris Postles Ramone Shupe Smyk Spiegelman Vanderwende Yearick	None
Current Status —	Sent to the Governor

Senator Elizabeth Lockman: “Sometimes the simplest ideas prove to be the hardest to enact. Setting a standard and uniform school registration process took a tremendous amount of work by the Delaware Department of Education (DDOE) and our 19 school districts. But after months of work, parents across our state will finally be able to register their children for school through the same online portal and under the same deadline no matter where they live, starting in the 2023-2024 school year.”

I want to thank my co-sponsor Rep. Melissa Minor-Brown, State Education Secretary Susan Bunting and all of the district administrators we worked with to make this moment possible. [This Bill] will remove a lot of confusion for families who now face different requirements for different school and help make our school registration process user friendly across our state.”