American Association of University Professors
The American Association of University Professors- Ohio Conference (OCAAUP) strongly opposes HB 698. The bill is an attempt to address a problem that does not exist. In doing so, HB 698 imposes exorbitant unfunded mandates on colleges and universities and further erodes academic freedom and tenure.
“This bill is another attack on higher education; it’s not about accountability. It’s nonsensical to claim non-compliance when the ink is barely dry on SB 1,” Jennifer Tisone Price, OCAAUP Executive Director, said. “Even the sponsor of SB 1 said HB 698 isn’t necessary.”
Price explained that most SB 1 policies were not required to be adopted by boards of trustees until Dec. 31, 2025. She said the deadline for the SSI compliance report, which is the existing mechanism by which the Chancellor of the Board of Higher Education can withhold funds, is even more notable. That report wasn’t due until Feb. 1, 2026—less than two weeks before HB 698 was introduced.
“This bill is not about accountability. There is a clear pattern of this legislature introducing bills that erode public education rather than strengthen it. Higher education has long been a proven pathway to economic mobility and opportunity, particularly for working families and first-generation students. They should be supporting and investing in it.”
OCAAUP also firmly disputes the sponsor’s claim that HB 698 does not impose new restrictions or prohibitions than what was included in SB 1. Price pointed out that the bill includes numerous provisions that are intended to further erode academic freedom and tenure and to micromanage things like workload policies.
“HB 698 includes nearly five pages of new language around retrenchment,” Price said. “This bill basically gives boards of trustees absolute authority to initiate retrenchment for any reason and use it to destroy tenure protections and further erode academic freedom.”
Price said the retrenchment provisions of the bill make it easy for boards of trustees to sacrifice education to appease powerful special interests, partisan politics, or the influence of large donors. She said the bill goes so far as to specifically prohibit things like positive performance reviews in retrenchment decisions.
“One would think that universities would want to keep top teaching talent and researchers,” Price said. “The focus should be on making sure they retain professors who repeatedly receive outstanding student evaluations and peer reviews; are nationally recognized experts in their fields; enhance the school’s academic reputation, and bring in millions of dollars in research funding.”
In addition to the anti-education provisions of the bill, OCAAUP takes issue with the DEI provisions of the bill and the targeting, tracking, and scrutiny of certain categories of employees. Price noted HB 698 requires universities to publish “justification reports” naming, detailing the responsibilities of, and disclosing the salaries of employees who previously worked on diversity initiatives.
“When lawmakers targeted programs that have historically employed minorities, as they did with SB 1, it raised serious concerns about equity and fairness. HB 698 requires the singling out specific categories of employees for special scrutiny and basically puts them on a watch list which raises serious constitutional questions,” Price said.
OCAAUP is concerned about the costs associated with the unfunded mandates and compliance measures. Price said SB 1 compliance is costing colleges and universities tens of millions of dollars and HB 698 will significantly increase them.
“Investing in education and instruction would be an exponentially better use of taxpayer dollars than ideologically driven unfunded mandates. Supporters of HB 698 are pricing working families out of a college education. Why are legislators trying to make it even harder for parents to send their kids to college?”
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