Kansas lawmakers hold back school potty training bill to allow time for solutions

Rep. Susan Estes, R-Wichita, appears on the House floor on March 19, 2025, in Topeka, Kansas. She is the chairwoman of the 2026 House Education Committee, where she halted a bill that proposed requiring potty training as a condition of kindergarten admissions. (Photo by Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)

TOPEKA — The Kansas bill that would have required kindergarteners to be potty trained before starting school stalled in committee.

House Education Committee chairwoman Rep. Susan Estes, a Republican from Wichita, declined to bring the bill up for debate Wednesday. She said she wanted to give school districts more time to find a solution.

“I do think there are some very legitimate concerns,” Estes said. “Parents needing support if they are going through this. But also, how do we make sure that everything is being done in a way that is safe for the educator as well as the student?”

House Bill 2486 garnered double the amount of opponents compared to proponents. Critics worried the bill would leave vulnerable children behind by excluding them from school and urged legislators to leave the decision up to local districts.

Rep. Sherri Brantley, a Republican from Great Bend, introduced the bill to help educators mitigate distractions. It would have required parents to confirm in writing that their child is potty trained before enrolling in school.