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An Alabama lawmaker is proposing a bill that would require public high schools that participate in national signing to host signing days for military enlistment and trade schools alongside athletics.
Rep. Chad Robertson, R-Heflin, the sponsor of HB 75, said in a recent interview that he hopes it would help military recruitment and workforce development.
“We just wanted to make it even across the plane that, you know, if the schools are doing the [signing days] for athletes, then we do a signing day for the ones that are going in the military,” he said.
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The move would come as branches of the armed forces try to improve overall recruitment While meeting recruiting goals in recent years, U.S. Army recruitment in 2022 missed its recruitment goal of 60,000 by nearly 25%. The U.S. Navy also missed its recruitment goal of 37,700 in 2023 by 20%.
“We just wanted to make it even across the plane that if the schools are doing the ones for athletes, then we do a signing day for the ones that are going in the military,” Robertson said. “It’s more of a signing day, though, for the military than would be for the technical because they actually do sign a contract at that point.”
Robertson said there are other schools, such as Cleveland High School in Blount County, that have already implemented a system similar to what the bill proposes.
“They kind of just do everybody all at once and it’s kind of an awards day,” he said. “That was brought to my attention in the committee too, when I passed it through the Education Committee in the House that there were schools that were already celebrating this.”
Under the bill, schools would be required to provide “reasonable accommodations” for signing day, including but not limited to a space with seating and internet connectivity.
This is Robertson’s second time filing a bill similar to this. The bill passed unanimously in the House during the 2025 legislative session but failed to make it through the Senate because of time constraints. He said he doesn’t anticipate any pushback from legislators on this bill when they begin meeting Jan. 13.
“I wish I started it a little bit earlier, so that’s why I prefiled it,” Robertson said.
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