House passes bill requiring parental notification of school therapy discussions

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah House lawmakers have passed a bill requiring parents to be informed of topics discussed during school therapy sessions.

“The therapist has to reach out to the parent and say, ‘hey, we met with your child. Here are just a couple high-level overviews of what we talked about,'” said Rep. Stephanie Gricius, R-Eagle Mountain, the HB281 sponsor. 

“Now, this is not getting into the detailed therapeutic notes,” Gricius said. “This is just saying something like, ‘hey, I met with Billy today. We talked about some bullying issues.'”

Gricius said parents can opt out of these notifications, but that the bill makes parental involvement the standard. Additionally, the bill gives parents the right to designate topics therapists are barred from discussing with their children.

Concerns over school therapy bill

Rep. Sandra Hollins, D-Salt Lake City, spoke in opposition to the bill saying it puts children at risk. During discussion on the House floor, she said having topics therapists can’t discuss with kids hinders the therapeutic process.

“What is stopping a child or a parent from telling a therapist, ‘you cannot talk about so-and -so in this practice,’ knowing that that child may be being abused by him?”

Gricius said therapists could still ask about abuse if a child discloses possible abuse.

“Essentially, the bill says you have to get parental consent before you can give therapy to a child in a school setting,” said Gricius. “A parent has the option to say, ‘I don’t want you to talk to my kids about certain things.'”

The school therapy bill now moves to the Senate for review. 

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