Accountability and funding for state-level school physical education and recess laws

School physical education (PE) and recess provide important opportunities to increase youth physical activity and socioemotional development. However, compliance with existing laws is low at the elementary level. Reported barriers to law implementation include limited accountability and funding. However, the number of state PE and recess laws that stipulate accountability and/or funding remains unknown. This cross-sectional review of active US state-level laws related to public elementary school PE and recess was conducted between October-December 2024. The Classification of Laws Associated with School Students and the National Association of State Boards of Education databases, along with web searches, were used to identify laws. Laws were double-coded for inclusion of accountability- and funding-related language. Forty-nine US states (96.1%) had PE laws and 22 (43.1%) had recess law; 21 (41.2%) had both. Among states with PE law, 12 (25.5%) and 1 (2.0%) included language on accountability and funding, respectively. Among states with recess laws, 5 (22.7%) included language related to accountability and zero contained funding-related language. State-level PE and recess legislation is highly prevalent, but most laws do not contain accountability-related language; virtually none contain funding-related language, which may be inhibiting implementation and driving inequities in related health outcomes. Additional research examining the relationship between accountability and funding language in PE and recess laws and the degree of implementation of the laws is necessary to help inform the development of stronger laws to support the provision of quality PE and recess in schools nationally.