HB 578 North Carolina House · 2025-2026 Session

The Jason Flatt Act of North Carolina.

HB 578, the Jason Flatt Act, requires all North Carolina public K-12 schools to implement suicide prevention education and training for school staff. It mandates that licensed educators complete at least one hour of annual suicide prevention training, while staff working with grades 6-12 must receive guidelines for identifying at-risk students and procedures for referrals. Schools must adopt a mental health plan including these elements, with initial staff training of six hours (within six months of hire) and two hours annually thereafter. The law applies to all public schools, charter schools, regional schools, and lab schools starting the 2025-2026 school year.

Issues: ✓ Education ✓ Healthcare

Bill status passed 3 of 5 stages cleared

Introduction

Mar 2025

Committee Review

Jun 2025

House Passage

May 2025

Senate Passage

Governor

Introduced Mar 31, 2025 Last action Jun 24, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 2 comparisons

What changed between versions

Edition 1 → Edition 2 · 4 edits

MODERATE

This bill revision expands mental health training requirements for school personnel by adding specific topics like substance abuse, sexual abuse prevention, and teen dating violence to the model training program. The changes also clarify grade level applicability for different training components and streamline the bill's formatting for committee review.

Scope change

The bill now explicitly requires mental health training to cover additional topics beyond suicide prevention, including substance abuse, sexual abuse prevention, sex trafficking prevention, and teenage dating violence. The model suicide risk referral protocol remains focused on grades 6-12, while the expanded mental health training now applies to grades K-12.

REQUIREMENT

Expanded the model mental health training program to include six new topics: youth mental health, suicide prevention, substance abuse, sexual abuse prevention, sex trafficking prevention, and teenage dating violence.

ELIGIBILITY

Changed the grade level for model mental health training from 'grades six through 12' to 'grades kindergarten through 12' to ensure younger students are included in the training scope.

TECHNICAL

Removed original formatting elements including the committee substitute date, sponsor information, and referred committees sections, likely for streamlined committee review purposes.

Reorganized the bill structure to align with committee substitute formatting standards, removing redundant sections and consolidating content for clarity.

Floor votes · House May 1, 2025

How they voted

109–0

Passed · 12 other

Total votes 121

May 1, 2025

D Democratic46

41 Yea 5

89% Yea

I Independent2

2 Yea

100% Yea

R Republican73

66 Yea 7

90% Yea

Vote distribution

All Yea All Nay Mixed No data

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Jun 24, 2025

Committee

Re-ref to Education/Higher Education. If fav, re-ref to Health Care. If fav, re-ref to Rules and Operations of the Senate

upper

May 5, 2025

Committee

Ref To Com On Rules and Operations of the Senate

upper

May 1, 2025

Lower · Passed

Passed 3rd Reading

lower

Apr 30, 2025

Lower · Passed

Reptd Fav

lower

Apr 29, 2025

Committee

Re-ref Com On Rules, Calendar, and Operations of the House

lower

Apr 29, 2025

Lower · Passed

Reptd Fav Com Substitute

lower

Apr 15, 2025

Committee

Re-ref Com On Education - K-12

lower

Apr 15, 2025

Lower · Passed

Reptd Fav

lower

Apr 1, 2025

Committee

Ref to the Com on Health, if favorable, Education - K-12, if favorable, Rules, Calendar, and Operations of the House

lower

Mar 31, 2025

Introduced

Filed

lower

3 primary · 42 co-sponsors