(Photo by graphicstock.com)

Achieve 60 AZ is a statewide initiative to get 60 percent of working age Arizonans to hold certificates or college degrees by 2030.

Education Secretary John B. King Jr. released a letter Tuesday asking governors and school leaders across the country to end corporal punishment. The practice is legal in more than a dozen states, including Arizona.

The letter called on leaders to replace what King called harmful and ineffective, with more supportive disciplinary measures. In Arizona, paddling is alive and well — at least on paper.    

“I would say close to 99.9 percent of them all have adopted what we have, it’s an internal policy, it’s a JKA corporal punishment, they’ve adopted that policy that indicates they do not allow corporal punishment within the schools," explained Heidi Vega, spokeswoman for the Arizona School Boards Association. She’s talking about the 225 public-school districts in the state. She said the decision to practice corporal punishment boils down to local control. Charles Tack is with Arizona the Department of Education.

“So those local governing boards have the ability to develop that policy in coordination with teachers and parents and member of their communities to determine if that is an option that they want to have in their schools,” he said.

Tack says Superintendent Diane Douglas has seen the letter. He also says her department does not plan to try to change the law. In his letter, King said that according to the Department’s Civil Rights Data Collection, more than 110,000 students were subject to corporal punishment in the 2013-14 academic year.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.