TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – A bill filed in the Florida House calls for mandatory middle school recess.
HB 1149, "Recess Requirements for Middle School Students,“ was filed on Wednesday by Rep. Paula Stark, R-St. Cloud.
Stark seeks to amend a provision of HB 7069, a multifaceted education bill signed in 2017 by then-Gov. Rick Scott, which in small part mandated 100 minutes of free-play recess each week for public-school students in kindergarten through grade 5.
Stark’s one-page bill would simply amend that statute, replacing the “5″ with an “8.”
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The bill is the brainchild of three Osceola County middle school students and was the winning pitch for the annual Build-a-Bill competition back in October. Stark takes the winning ideas to Tallahassee each legislative session.
The three teens, Carly Leach, Lucy Graham and Elysmar Francois, pitched a built-in break time during the school day to allow students time to recharge, socialize or read, saying it would help with mental exhaustion and improve the learning experience.
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“It’s hard to shake off the exhausting feeling from work,” Francois said. “And so people from work have work breaks. School is just like work without the pay. And so because of that, we believe that kids should also have a time to have a break, and just decompress, relax, take a breather from everything that’s been happening during school."
The idea reminded the judges of something most kids today have only seen in movies or on TV — study hall.
Stark says she has seen concerns from local school districts about the cost of the bill, and she’s working to address that.
The proposed change to Florida law follows recent attempts by some Florida lawmakers to end the recess mandate altogether. Those lawmakers claimed that removing the mandate would give school districts more flexibility, but the reversal was ultimately removed from the bills it was to be part of after getting a negative reaction from the public.
State Sen. Kristen Arrington, D-Kissimmee, is sponsoring the bill in the Florida Senate.
Stark’s bill would go into effect on July 1, if approved.
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