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Ohio lawmakers have passed a bill to make this possible require schools to teach students how to graduate from high school, get a job, and get married – in that order – before having a child. They call this order of events the success sequence.
Ohio Senate Bill 276 during Wednesday’s session, the House of Representatives passed by a 58-36 majority, and the Ohio Senate agreed to changes made to the bill later that evening, before going on holiday recess.
Ohio State Representatives Haraz Ghanbari, Gayle Manning and Jason Stephens joined Ohio House Democrats in voting against the bill.
State Sen. Kristina Roegner, R-Hudson, introduced the bill, which was originally intended as legislation to allow Ohio to join the Interstate Compact for School Psychologists, which allows licensed professionals to provide services across state lines.
The bill passed the Ohio Senate unanimously in November.
The Ohio House of Representatives Education Committee made changes to the bill, including adding a success sequence.
“Young people are statistically significantly less likely to live in poverty if they graduate from high school, work full-time, and get married before having children,” said Ohio Rep. Sarah Fowler-Arthur: R-Ashtabula.
“This allows young people to make informed decisions about education, work, family and future stability.”
The Heritage Foundation – a right-wing think tank that published Project 2025 — provides model success sequence legislation.
The bill requires the Ohio Department of Education and Labor to have a list of success sequence curriculum for grades 6-12, which would be a graduation requirement.
Following these sequences of events means the risk of living in poverty in adulthood is “definitely lower”. Bill says.
However, a 2021 study funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found that those who graduated from high school, worked full time, and were married were less likely to be impoverished, but the order did not matter much.
““I feel like some of us have missed a basic statistical lesson that correlation is not causation.” said state Rep. Beryl Brown Piccolantonio, D-Gahanna.
“It completely ignores the fact that there are so many other explanations for why so many people have so many difficulties in life.[…]Teaching that graduation, then a job, then marriage, then children equals success also ignores all the unique ways people live in our state.”
Ohio Senate Bill 156self-assessment of success sequence, it passed the Ohio Senate on party lines last year.
State Rep. Sean Brennan, D-Parma, he told the story of his mother who graduated from high school, got a job, got married and eventually left to raise two children.
“Her journey was not a fairytale,” Brennan said. “She suffered terrible abuse at the hands of her husband and lost everything when he left. She is forced to work two low-paid, non-union jobs, supplemented with public assistance, to put clothes on her back and food on the table for her children.”
She later died of breast cancer.
“The so-called success sequence did not save my mother,” Brennan said. “It did not protect her from poverty or systemic social problems.[…]Just because some people follow a particular path avoid poverty does not mean that those steps will bring success to everyone.”
Brennan also said teaching success sequences puts another burden on teachers.
“They are already stretched thin, and this part of this bill adds another requirement,” he said.
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