Archives for category: Florida
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Florida: Legislature Passes Law to Keep Secret DeSantis’s Travel Records

By dianeravitch
May 15, 2023 //
20

The Florida legislature passed a law, which Governor DeSantis signed, exempting records of his travel from the state’s robust public disclosure laws. The law is retroactive so no one can get information about where the governor and other public officials have traveled in the past. The justification is that the governor needs secrecy for security but this does not explain why travels in the past will be hidden from the press and taxpayers.

The Governor’s travels are paid for with taxpayer money, but the taxpayer has no right to know how much was spent and for what purpose.

DeSantis continues to build his authoritarian record, which all can see, unlike his travel record.

Categories Accountability, DeSantis, Elections, Ethics, Fascism, Florida, Funding

Florida Rejects 35% of Social Studies Texts as Too Leftist

By dianeravitch
May 9, 2023 //
24

The Orlando Sentinel reported today that the State Education Department had rejected 35% of the social studies textbooks submitted for review because of leftist content. The DeSantis administration objects to any references to “social justice” or negative references to capitalism.

Leslie Postal of the Sentinel wrote:

Florida rejected 35% of the social studies textbooks publishers hoped to sell to public schools this year and forced others to delete or change passages state leaders disliked, including references to “why some citizens are choosing to ‘Take a Knee’ to protest police brutality” and “new calls for social justice” after the death of George Floyd.

A press release from the Florida Department of Education on Tuesday said 66 of 101 textbooks submitted have been approved, many after making changes the state demanded. On April 6, the department gave approval to only 19 of the books but then worked for the past month to get publishers to update their texts.

The goal was “materials that focus on historical facts and are free from inaccuracies or ideological rhetoric,” said Education Commissioner Manny Diaz in a statement.

The textbooks are for elementary and middle school social studies classes as well as civics, economics, U.S. history and world history courses.

In addition to social justice topics, some of the textbooks initially rejected failed to accurately describe communism and socialism, the department said, and those passages were revamped to emphasize the negatives of both economic systems…

The process became highly political a year ago, however, when the state initially rejected 42 math textbooks, a historic number, and touted the news with a press release that said, “Florida Rejects Publishers’ Attempts to Indoctrinate Students.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration sounded a similar alarm Tuesday.

“The political indoctrination of children through the K-12 public education system is a very real and prolific problem in this country,” tweeted Bryan Griffin, DeSantis’ press secretary. “Just look at some of these examples from textbooks submitted this year to @EducationFL.”

Griffin highlighted a passage from a middle school textbook that described a socialist economy as one that “keeps things nice and even and without unnecessary waste.” The passage went on to say, “These societies may promote greater equality among people while still providing a fully functioning government-supervised economy.”

The department did not indicate what textbook included that passage but shared the new version about “planned economies” that replaced the one about socialist economies. The new passage reads, “Critics say these planned economies have slow development and fewer technological advances” in part because they limit “human incentive. In other words, why do anything if the government is eventually going to do it for you?”

The other examples the department shared included two related to social justice, police brutality and racism. The elementary school textbook that mentioned people taking a knee during the National Anthem as a form of protest was deleted as “not age appropriate,” the department said. So was a passage from a middle school book that discussed “new calls for social justice, including the formation of the Black Lives Matter group and the protests after the killing of Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer.”

The department also disliked that a middle school textbook about the Holocaust asked, “What social justice issues are included in the Hebrew Bible?” The line was changed to “What are some of the key principles included in the Hebrew Bible?”

The DeSantis’ administration last year claimed the math books contained critical race theory, the idea that racism is embedded in American institutions, and other unacceptable topics such as social emotional learning and culturally responsive learning.

DeSantis and other Republicans argue CRT aims to make white children feel guilty and to teach children to hate the United States and that, while traditionally a graduate school topic, its tenets have seeped into K-12 classrooms. The Legislature last year passed what the governor dubbed his “stop woke” act that outlaws the teaching of the concept in public schools.

Opponents of DeSantis’ efforts argued the real aim was to prevent children from learning about tough topics such as slavery and racial discrimination and said they feared it would lead to a whitewashing of history.

Most of those who reviewed the math textbooks — math teachers and professors — found nothing objectionable in the texts, with only three of about 70 reviewers raising concerns about CRT. Eventually, many of the rejected books were approved after making some changes. The three reviewers who raised questions about the math textbooks were a member of the conservative Moms for Liberty group and two people affiliated with the Hillsdale College, a conservative Christian school in Michigan aligned with the DeSantis administration.

The math book rejections stunned school district administrators, who had already made plans to purchase the rejected textbooks — which were part of a longer list first posted to the education department’s website. As they typically do, committees of teachers and curriculum experts reviewed the books before recommending which ones should be purchased and had not found material they found objectionable.

The districts needed to buy new math textbooks last year and new social studies textbooks this year to make sure their instructional materials match with new state standards for those subjects.

Mindful of what happened last year, Orange County Public Schools decided to select both first and second-choice options for new social studies books this year. The Orange County School Board approved its list of recommended books April 25, but the district has not yet made any purchases, which could cost more than $21 million.

The social studies textbooks OCPS selected as its top choice for elementary schools is on the rejected list the education department released Tuesday. The district could go with its second-choice option, which is approved, or wait to see if the other wins approval in the coming weeks.

Categories Academic Freedom, Accountability, Bigotry, Citizenship, Civics, Civil Rights, Corruption, Curriculum, Education Industry, Extremism, Fascism, Florida, Ignorance

High Schools Canceling Student Plays to Avoid Controversy

By dianeravitch
May 9, 2023 //
49

Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post reports that high schools are canceling productions of plays that might offend parents and members of the community. The “culture wars” have watered down which topics are permissible in 2023. Once again, we see how fear of offending anyone restricts freedom.

She writes:

The crew had built most of the set. Choreographers had blocked out almost all the dances. The students were halfway through rehearsals.


Then in late January, musical director Vanessa Allen called an emergency meeting. She told the cast and crew of 21 teens that their show — the musical “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” — was off.

Board members in Ohio’s Cardinal Local Schools disliked some features of “Spelling Bee,” Allen explained, including a song about erections, the appearance of Jesus Christ and the fact that one character has two fathers.


Sobs broke out across the room, said Riley Matchinga, 18, who was slated to play one of the leads: Logainne Schwartzandgrubenierre, the character whose fathers are gay. “Everyone’s faces just fell,” she said. “I could see everyone’s hearts melting, because we had worked so hard.”


Following a record-setting surge in efforts to change curriculums and ban books at schools nationwide, the education culture war has now reached the stage. The controversy in Cardinal is one of a number of recent instances in which school administrators have intervened to nix or alter school theatrical productions deemed objectionable — often because they feature LGBTQ characters or deal with issues of race and racism.

In Florida’s Duval County Public Schools this January, administrators stopped a production of the play “Indecent,” which details a love affair between two women, due to its “mature content.” In February, Indiana’s Northwest Allen County Schools pulled the plug on a production of the play “Marian” after adults raised the alarm over its depiction of a same-sex couple and a nonbinary character. And in March, Iowa’s South Tama County Community School District halted a performance of the play “August: Osage County” over fears that its treatment of suicide, addiction and racism was inappropriate for school-aged children.

Censorship of K-12 student productions has been happening for years, said Howard Sherman, managing director of the performing arts center at New York’s Baruch College. Since 2011, Sherman has tracked and fought efforts to end or edit school theater, assisting with roughly four dozen such cases, many of which never became public.


Still, this most recent wave of opposition seems more intense and organized than in past years, Sherman said, and more tightly focused on plays and musicals with LGBTQ content.


“Something that was being dealt with community by community has now, for some people, become a cause, ” he said. “You see politicians and officials enacting rules and laws which are incredibly onerous and designed to enforce a very narrow view of what students can see, read, learn or act on stage.”

The logic: if high school students see a play with gay characters, they might think being gay is normal, and they too might be gay. Counter-logic: the same students are far more likely to see movies, TV, and plays where people are not gay.

Robert Pondiscio of the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, defended censorship:

“You have to be mindful of local values,” Pondiscio said. “School has always existed to signal to children what is worth knowing and valuable, what we praise and condemn, and you have to apply that to musicals as well.”

In North Lebanon School District in Pennsylvania, the school board voted down a proposed performance of “The Addams Family,” which is the most frequently performed high school musical. The board thought it was too gloomy.

In Ohio, the students won a minor victory:

In Ohio’s Cardinal schools, Matchinga and her peers were determined to put on “Spelling Bee.” They bombarded the school board with emails questioning the cancellation.


Musical director Allen began revising the script to erase lines board members dubbed inappropriate — eliminating profanity, a line about “[beating] up” kids and replacing the phrase “fake mom” with “step mom,” according to school documents obtained by The Washington Post. She was assisted by Rachel Sheinkin, one of the writers of the 2005 Broadway musical. Ultimately, after requesting more than two dozen edits and receiving 12, the school board voted to let “Spelling Bee” proceed.

Alterations to Matchinga’s lines included replacing “and I’ve heard she is pro-choice/though still a virgin” with “but she will not make her choice/til she is certain.”


“I don’t think that really made a big effect on the story, and the show was still really funny and we got a ton of laughs,” Matchinga said. “Overall, I think it was okay.”

But in the future, the school board will have veto power on which plays may be staged.

Let’s see, “Mary Poppins” should pass muster. What else?

Categories Art, Arts Education, Bigotry, Censorship, Creativity, Cruelty, Democracy, Extremism, Florida, Freedom, Gender

Jonathan Chait: The GOP Plan to Take Over American Education

By dianeravitch
May 9, 2023 //
38

Jonathan Chait wrote an excellent article about the Republican plan to control, destroy, and censor American education. It is the cover story in this week’s New York magazine.

Chait and I have long disagreed about charter schools and will continue to do so. The article does not get into privatization, and the Republicans’ determination to divert public money to religious and private schools via vouchers. Nor does it touch on the growth and scandals of the charter industry. It’s hard to ignore privatization as a main line of attacking the public purpose of public schools, but Chait covers culture war issues only.

Chait says that, in the view of conservatives, left wing indoctrination occurs in religious schools, private schools, and charter schools, so choice will not solve the problem (the problem being the left wing capture of the culture). The answer, then, for the rightwing is to capture control of the institutions and replace left wing indoctrination with rightwing indoctrination.

The article digs into the Republican effort to destroy academic freedom, freedom to teach, freedom to learn, and to turn American schools and universities into purveyors of rightwing ideology. Two central figures in this conspiracy are Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and rightwing ideologue Chris Rufo.

Florida is indeed the model for the Republican attack on education. It is here that the Governor boasts about his Stop WOKE Act, which blocks teaching about topics that might cause discomfort (especially teaching factually accurate accounts of racist brutality in American politics); his Don’t Say Gay Act (which eliminates any instruction about homosexuality in K-3, recently amended to grades K-8); his successful capture of tiny progressive New College and to turn it into the Hillsdale of the South; his intention to take control of the state’s public colleges and universities, eliminate tenure, and purge progressive professors; and his encouragement of censorship of books about race, racism, and gender issues. Add to these DeSantis’ demonizing of the minuscule number of transgender students, as well as his bullying of drag queens, and you have a major state that has embraced fascism and scapegoating of powerless minorities. Florida is also notable for the billions it spends on lightly regulated charters and unregulated, unaccountable vouchers.

Readers of this blog are familiar with DeSantis’ war on public schools and higher education, and his control of curriculum and leadership. I can’t think of another state where the Governor has moved so aggressively to control every aspect of public education. Others have recognized the limits of their power. DeSantis does not.

We also know that Florida recently enacted universal vouchers, offering to subsidize the tuition of rich students. And that the wife of the Republican Speaker of the House, then state education commissioner, Richard Corcoran, now president of New College, started a charter. And that many legislators are financially tied to charters.

This article is about the culture wars, however, not privatization.

Chait writes:

Republicans have begun saying things about American schools that not long ago would have struck them as peculiar, even insane. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida has called schools “a cesspool of Marxist indoctrination.” Former secretary of State Mike Pompeo predicts that “teachers’ unions, and the filth that they’re teaching our kids,” will “take this republic down.” Against the backdrop of his party, Donald Trump, complaining about “pink-haired communists teaching our kids” and “Marxist maniacs and lunatics” running our universities, sounds practically calm.

More ominously, at every level of government, Republicans have begun to act on these beliefs. Over the past three years, legislators in 28 states have passed at least 71 bills controlling what teachers and students can say and do at school. A wave of library purges, subject-matter restrictions, and potential legal threats against educators has followed.

Education has become an obsession on the political right, which now sees it as the central battlefield upon which this country’s future will be settled. Schoolhouses are being conscripted into a cataclysmic war in which no compromise is possible — in which a child in a red state will be discouraged from asking questions about sexual identity, or a professor will be barred from exploring the ways in which white supremacy has shaped America today, or a trans athlete will be prohibited from playing sports…

While there have been political battles over the schools for many years, but this controversy is different. Republicans are going for the jugular. They believe that “the left” has taken over the nation’s educational institutions and is determined to indoctrinate the next generation to despise their own country. Nothing could be more ridiculous, but facts don’t get in the way of their culture war.

He writes:

The Republican Party emerged from the Trump era deeply embittered. A large share of the party believed that Democrats had stolen their way back into power. But this sentiment took another form that was not as absurd or, at least, not as clearly disprovable. The theory was that Republicans were subverted by a vast institutional conspiracy. Left-wing beliefs had taken hold among elite institutions: the media, the bureaucracy, corporations, and, especially, schools.

This theory maintains that this invisible progressive network makes successful Republican government impossible. Because the enemy permanently controls the cultural high ground, Republicans lose even when they win. Their only recourse is to seize back these nonelected institutions….

“Left-wing radicals have spent the past 50 years on a ‘long march through the institutions,’” claims Manhattan Institute fellow and conservative activist Chris Rufo, who is perhaps the school movement’s chief ideologist. “We are going to reverse that process, starting now.”

Many institutions figure in Republicans’ plans. They are developing proposals to cleanse the federal workforce of politically subversive elements, to pressure corporations to resist demands by their “woke employees,” and to freeze out the mainstream media. But their attention has centered on the schools. “It is the schools — where our children spend much of their waking hours — that have disproportionate influence over American society, seeding every other institution that has succumbed to left-wing ideological capture,” writes conservative commentator Benjamin Weingarten.

Republicans are afraid that the liberal bias of schools and colleges is turning their children into liberals, intent on advancing social justice. They feel a sense of urgency about gaining control of these agencies of indontrination.

DeSantis’ approach is straightforward: Taxpayers pay for schools. Why shouldn’t they control them? Why shouldn’t they tell them what to teach and what not to teach?

Chait errs in describing Florida’s efforts to restrict the accurate teaching of African American history. He writes:

It is possible for legislatures to restrict some of the pedagogical fads of recent years without preventing children from learning unvarnished historical truths about slavery, reconstruction, Jim Crow, and its aftermath. Reports have described bans on lessons that make students feel guilty, when they have merely restricted lessons that instruct them to feel guilty, a reasonable thing to ask. Commentators on the internet likewise depicted Florida as banning the teaching of African American history, when in fact the state merely objected to elements of the AP African American History curriculum, ultimately resulting in a revised version.

This is understating the active role that the DeSantis team played in squashing the brutal facts about African American history in Florida and the U.S. The Stop WOKE Act banned teaching “critical race theory,” which most people can’t define but assume that it refers to systemic racism. The DeSantis team has banned textbooks in math and social studies that showed any interest in “social justice.”

DeSantis and his education commissioner didn’t “merely object” to parts of the AP African American History course, they threatened to exclude the AP course and test from the state’s schools altogether, a move that would likely be followed by other deep red states. This hits the College Board where it hurts, in their revenues. DeSantis has objected not only to CRT, but to “social-emotional learning,” which he sees as indoctrination but which typically means exercises in perseverance, self-control, and other workaday approaches to collaboration and respect for others. Like what I learned in elementary school many decades ago.

Are there teachers who go too far in imposing their own beliefs (from both the left and the right)? Surely. But Chait observes:

A broader problem with the wave of conservative legislation is that it is responding to a wildly hyperbolic version of reality. In a very large country with a fragmented education system, there are going to be plenty of examples of outrageous or radical teaching in the schools on a daily basis without necessarily indicating anything about the system’s overall character. As conservatives grew alarmed about left-wing teachers, their favorite media sources started curating examples of it to stoke their outrage.

DeSantis projects Florida as a model for the nation, and he looks to Hungary as a model for Florida. Its leader Viktor Orban has tamed the universities by controlling them. Chris Rufo recently spent a month in Hungary, learning how Orban has silenced the left.

Orbán’s example has shown the government’s power over the academy can be absolute. DeSantis is simply the first Republican to appreciate the potential of this once-unimaginable use of state power to win the culture wars. Even before DeSantis’s plan has passed, Republicans in North Carolina, Texas, and North Dakota rushed out bills to eliminate tenure for professors.

I urge you to read the article in full. Aside from his leaving out privatization as the keystone of the Republican attack on public schools, the article fails to mention the big money behind the culture wars and privatization. DeVos, Walton, Koch, Yass. They are an important part of the story. And there are many more (I have a long list of billionaires, foundations, and corporations funding privatization in my book Slaying Goliath.)

Chait’s incisive analysis is a good primer for the elections of 2024. Implicit are the many reasons why Democrats must be prepared to defend teachers and professors, to protect both schools and universities from the takeovers planned by Republican legislators, to gear up for the fight against censorship, to resist incipient fascism, and to hold the line for our democratic principles.

Categories Censorship, Civil Rights, Curriculum, Democracy, DeSantis, Education Industry, Extremism, Florida, Freedom, Freedom of Speech, Freedom to Read, Funding, Gender, Privatization, Racism, Religion, Republicans, Vouchers

Florida Bans Restrictions on Fertilizer Despite Risk to Water Quality

By dianeravitch
May 4, 2023 //
31

Florida’s lakes, ponds, and rivers have been plagued by red tide and green algae, which grows faster because of fertilizer runoff from the grounds near the water. Many localities have banned the use of fertilizer near vulnerable water during the rainy season to protect water quality. The fertilizer encourages the growth of the slime in the water.

However, the legislature has passed a bill to stop these restrictions on fertilizer. The bill was based on research funded by the fertilizer industry. The legislative majority is destroying the environment, because the fertilizer industry can pay out more than environmental activists.

The Miami Herald reported:

Florida legislators are poised to block one of the most effective tools local governments say they have to protect water quality in their communities in the face of red tide and blue-green algae outbreaks by banning rainy season restrictions on fertilizer use.

A measure quietly tucked into a budget proposal over the weekend, would prohibit at least 117 local governments from “adopting or amending a fertilizer management ordinance” during the 2023-24 budget year, requiring them to rely on less restrictive regulations developed by the University of Florida, which are supported by the state’s phosphate industry, the producers of fertilizer.

Legislative leaders tentatively agreed to a $116 billion budget on Monday and, with no public debate or discussion, included the fertilizer language that emerged late Sunday.

Categories Accountability, DeSantis, Education Reform, Environment, Florida, For-Profit

Florida Bars Spending on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at State Universities

By dianeravitch
May 3, 2023 //
39

Today was a big day in the Florida legislature, where GOP legislators are busy banning and defunding whatever they don’t like. DEI is the WOKE enemy of the moment. Professors who teach about racism or sexism need not apply.

TALLAHASSEE — As Gov. Ron DeSantis and his allies target “woke” ideology, the Florida House on Wednesday gave final approval to a bill that includes preventing colleges and universities from spending money on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

The bill (SB 266), which now will go to DeSantis, touched off a fierce debate about Florida’s higher-education system and campus speech.

“Diversity, equity and inclusion, like so many other terms adopted by the woke left, is being used as a club to silence things, to say that if you don’t agree with them, you are somehow racist or homophobic or whatever other word that you want to use to criticize people,” said Rep. Randy Fine, R-Brevard County. “The fact of the matter is these terms have been hijacked by those who want to use them to bully and use them to shut down debate, to actually do the opposite of what these words are supposed to do.”

But bill critics said diversity, equity and inclusion efforts are important and that the legislation will drive away top faculty members and students.

Categories Academic Freedom, Accountability, Bigotry, DeSantis, Equity, Extremism, Fascism, Florida, Gender, Ignorance, Race, Racism

Florida Senate Expands “Don’t Say Gay” Bill, Regulating Pronouns and Book Bans

By dianeravitch
May 3, 2023 //
13

According to Wikipedia, Justice Louis Brandeis popularized the use of the term “laboratories of democracy” to describe progressive states.

Laboratories of democracy is a phrase popularized by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis in New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann to describe how “a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.”[

Florida is now controlled by religious extremists who do not hesitate to impose their personal beliefs on others. Florida is our very own “laboratory of fascism,” where the governor and the legislature pass laws to limit the rights and benefits of their people. I will continue to follow the trajectory of nascent fascism in the Sunshine State because other Republican-controlled states see it as a model.

Today, the Florida Senate expanded the “Don’t Say Bill,” requiring teachers to use pronouns that correspond to their students’ biological gender. Surely, given the tiny number of transgender students in the schools (1%?), this cannot be an urgent problem requiring legislation. But Florida legislators have boldly restricted pronoun usage and made it easier to ban books.

In one of the most controversial education issues of the 2023 legislative session, the Florida Senate on Wednesday passed a measure that would expand last year’s “Parental Rights in Education” law — known to critics as “don’t say gay.”

The bill, which is ready to go to Gov. Ron DeSantis, also seeks to restrict the way teachers and students can use their preferred pronouns in schools, a provision that has drawn ire from LGBTQ-advocacy groups.

The Republican-controlled Senate voted 27-12 along party lines to pass the bill (HB 1069), with Democrats arguing the measure is an effort to “legislate away the gay.” The House voted 77-35 to pass the bill last month. DeSantis is expected to sign it.

The Senate extended the Don’t Say Gay law from K-3 to K-8.

But Senate Minority Leader Lauren Book, D-Davie, said the bill “marginalizes children” and represents an insult to teachers.

“This bill insults the professionalism of educators. It takes away freedom of speech, freedom of thought and freedom to be treated equally in our public schools,” Book said.

Wednesday’s vote came after the State Board of Education last month approved a rule change that largely prohibited instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in all grades. The rule dealt with an educators’ code of conduct and spelled out that teachers could face suspension or revocation of their educator certificates for violations of the rule…

The bill also would require that it “shall be the policy” of every public school that “a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”

Teachers and other school employees would be prohibited from telling students their preferred pronouns and would be barred from asking students about their preferred pronouns….

The law goes on to make it easier to ban books.

The bill also would build on another controversial 2022 law that increased scrutiny of school-library books and instructional materials. The bill, in part, would take steps to make the process of objecting to books and instructional materials easier…

In instances where an objection is made based on possible pornographic content or material that “describes sexual conduct,” the bill would require the materials to be removed from schools within five days of the objection and “remain unavailable to students of that school until the objection is resolved.”

Sen. Tina Polsky, D-Boca Raton, described that part of the bill as a “ban-first, review-later” policy.

Categories Accountability, Corruption, Cruelty, DeSantis, Elections, Extremism, Fascism, Florida

Broward County, Florida, Endorses “National Day of Prayer”

By dianeravitch
May 3, 2023 //
15

There must be something in the water in Florida, and it’s not fluoride. The Broward County school board had a debate about endorsing a National Day of Prayer and voted 5-3 in favor. The discussion was interesting. Undoubtedly there will be parents who fund the idea offensive, maybe there will be lawsuits. Maybe a National Day of Reflection or a National Day of Kindness would be less controversial. Prayer is certainly an insertion of religious ritual into what is supposedly a secular institution.

The Miami Herald reported:

The Broward School Board voted 5-3 Tuesday to endorse the National Day of Prayer Thursday in the district’s public schools after a contentious debate on whether the action was inappropriate and rushed — or positive and much-needed.

This is the first time the Broward School Board officially recognized the day, Cathleen Brennan, a district spokesperson, told the Herald Wednesday.

The National Day of Prayer is an annual day of observance held on the first Thursday of May in which people should “turn to God in prayer and meditation.” The commemoration dates back to 1952 when President Harry Truman signed the bill into law after Congress passed the measure in a joint resolution. In 1988, former president Ronald Reagan designated the first Thursday in May to recognize it.

Board member Daniel Foganholi introduced the resolution, which “urges all schools, centers, departments, parents, businesses, governmental and community agencies and the entire community to participate in the significant role prayer plays in shaping the lives of our students and the future of our great nation.”

In March, the Miami-Dade School Board unanimously approved for the second consecutive year a similar measure to commemorate the National Day of Prayer in the district’s public schools.

Foganholi, who represents District 1, said he remembers standing alongside his peers around the flagpole about 15 minutes before class started and praying on the National Day of Prayer, and he wants students nowadays to do it too. He attended a public school and a charter school in Broward.

“It wasn’t a huge party — it wasn’t music, it wasn’t lights. It was a simple day,” he said. “We would join hands people of different faiths, different people just coming together and sharing a moment, a moment of prayer.”

Foganholi, who was appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in December to replace Rodney Velez, whom voters elected in November but couldn’t be sworn into office because of his former criminal conviction, and board members Debra Hixon, Torey Alston, Lori Alhadeff and Brenda Fam voted in favor.

Board members Sarah Leonardi, Jeff Holness and Allen Zeman opposed it. Board member Nora Rupert was absent because she was in the hospital.

Hixon, the vice chair from the countywide Seat 9, initially questioned whether the resolution would infringe upon the separation of church and state under the U.S. Constitution.

“It’s just a statement of support of the Day of Prayer. It does not contain any language that states that the students are going to have to pray or not pray,” Broward Schools Interim General Counsel Madelyn Batista told Hixon. “And just for clarification purposes, student-led prayer in schools is permitted; the only thing that is not permitted is if it is raised by someone who works for the School Board.”

Leonardi, from District 3, challenged that. She said that the statement wouldn’t be “student-led” because it would be coming from the School Board itself and ordering all bodies under it to participate.

Leonardi, a former teacher, described herself as a “deeply religious person” who has been a member of her church for 10 years and served in it for five years. But she rejected the resolution.

“As a teacher, I never brought my faith into the classroom. If students spoke up about their faith or lack thereof, I encouraged that discussion, but it was really important for me as a teacher and as a person of authority in that classroom to not impose my beliefs on my students,” she said. “I personally think that prayer is so important and I respect anyone’s choice to celebrate their faith and practice their faith, but I think when we, as a board, in a position of authority, urge people to participate in a faith-based celebration, it’s inappropriate.

“I respect the intent with which this was brought forward,” she added, “but right now this is not something that I can support on legal and moral grounds.”

Categories Florida, Religion, Separation of church and state

Florida: How the State Tries to Cover Up Problems in Voucher Schools

By dianeravitch
May 1, 2023 //
15

Leslie Postal and Annie Martin are star reporters for The Orlando Sentinel. In 2017, they wrote a three-part series on Florida’s voucher schools, showing the incidence of discrimination and unqualified staff, among other problems. The series, called “Schools Without Rules,” painted a devastating portrait of the low quality of the voucher sector.

This year, they sought access to the state’s records to open a new investigation. The state stonewalled them and put a high price on their access to public records. Here is their report:

One former teacher’s four-page complaint to the state urged an investigation into “the vast scope of educational neglect” taking place at the private Christian school in Osceola County. Another detailed concerns at a South Florida Jewish school. “Cleaning lady substituting for teacher,” it said.

In other complaints, parents wrote about upsetting incidents or worrisome deficiencies at their children’s private schools.

“Children of all ages are running out of classrooms screaming and hitting each other,” an Orange County mother wrote.

“They don’t provide lunch and they don’t even have a place to eat,” a Fort Lauderdale parent wrote.

“I don’t see any evidence of academics,” wrote a Panhandle parent.

These concerns were detailed in written complaints filed with the Florida Department of Education from 2015 to 2020 against private schools that take Florida school vouchers, the state scholarships that help families pay their children’s tuition bills.

In the past 18 months, at least 238 new complaints have been filed, according to the department. The Orlando Sentinel requested copies of those documents, and any related information gathered from the schools, on Jan. 24.

The request was similar to the public records requests it has made for complaints against private schools several times since 2017.

The education department said in a Feb. 15 email that it could provide copies of the complaint files for an estimated charge of $10,414.70 — an amount the newspaper considers exorbitant, out-of-line with what was charged in past years and an effort to block access to public records on a topic of public interest.

“The government isn’t supposed to be turning public records into a profit center for their agencies, and that seems to be what has developed in the last few years,” said Julie Anderson, editor-in-chief of the Orlando Sentinel and the Sun Sentinel in South Florida. “Either that, or they don’t want to fulfill the request.”

Journalists across the state are receiving excessive cost estimates in response to public records requests, said Michael Barfield, director of public access initiatives for the Florida Center Government Accountability, a Sarasota-based government watchdog group. He said he’s seen “a huge explosion and increase in fees” assessed by state agencies during the past 18 months to two years.

“I’ve been doing this for 30-plus years,” Barfield said. “It’s accurate to say that in the digital era, where everything is computerized, accessing public records has become more expensive than it was during the era when everything was on a typewriter and in filing cabinets.”

He added, “I’ve never seen fees like what we’re seeing now.”

$2 billion and growing

School vouchers are a hot topic in Florida, and across the country, this year. The complaints filed against participating private schools, the Sentinel has found, provide a window into the workings of some of the private schools that take part in the state voucher programs but operate mostly outside of state control.

The state’s current voucher programs spend nearly $2 billion to send more than 252,000 students to about 2,000 private schools. Gov. Ron DeSantis last month signed legislation making those programs, now mostly targeted to youngsters from low-income families, “universal” so that all school-age students in the state are eligible for scholarships.

State leaders predict about 80,000 additional students will take these state vouchers next school year.

In the Sentinel’s 2017 “Schools Without Rules” investigation, complaints helped the paper to document private schools that had hired teachers whose only academic credential was a high school diploma, employed instructors with criminal records, falsified fire and health inspections for their buildings and taught questionable academic lessons.

For the latest records request, the education department did not say how many pages of documents were in the 238 complaint files the Sentinel wants, but it estimated it would take 400 hours, or the equivalent of 10 work weeks, and “extensive use of resources and extensive clerical and supervisory assistance by the Department’s personnel” to fulfill it.

In 2017, the Sentinel paid $49.77 for eight complaint files, which were provided six days after the request was filed. At that rate, it would expect to pay about $1,500 for the 238 files. This year, it took the department three weeks to provide a cost estimate that topped $10,000.

The complaints typically do not lead to any action against the school. By law, the state has no control over the operations of private schools, even if they rely completely on state scholarships for their revenue.

Unlike public schools, such private schools can hire teachers without college degrees, teach whatever curricula they choose and set up in facilities — from storefronts to church meeting rooms — that do not meet Florida’s school building codes.

A parent who complained about a Miami school in 2020, for example, said it was not “providing the proper education, nutritional lunch or physical education” the family expected. The department sent the parent its standard letter saying it did not regulate private schools, but the parent “may wish to transfer your student to any other scholarship participating school.”

Typically, private schools can keep secret much of their information, from staff credentials to student success on standardized tests. But when someone files a complaint, a public record is created. If the complaint alleges violations of scholarship rules, the state can investigate and ask the school to provide documents, including employee background checks or credentials.

A single complaint the education department shared with the Sentinel in March — as attorneys for the paper and the department negotiated the scope and cost of the public records request — showed, for example, that three teachers at Downey Christian School in east Orange did not have bachelor’s degrees in October 2021, when a complaint against the school was filed.

Those instructors taught middle school math and science, high school English and high school math, the records show. The school enrolls more than 300 students who use state scholarships, bringing in more than $1.4 million, according to data from Step Up For Students, which administers most of Florida’s scholarships.

Downey’s administrator did not respond to a request for comment.

Most of the complaints from 2017 to 2020, many of them handwritten, detail the concerns of parents with children enrolled in the schools and the teachers who work there. But sometimes they include emails and documents from government officials, such as child welfare investigators or fire marshals.

‘Severe fire code violations’

In 2016, for example, the Orange County fire marshal contacted the education department about “severe fire code violations” that are “life safety critical” at a Pine Hills school.

The department said Agape Christian Academy had submitted paperwork indicating it was in compliance with fire codes, a requirement to take vouchers, but the fire marshal told state officials his office did not produce the documents.

The department revoked the school from the voucher program in 2017 after the fire code violations and other problems came to light.

That same year, a child welfare investigator raised concerns about the criminal record of a teacher at another west Orange school. Under state law, the woman should not have been hired at a school that accepted state scholarships, and the school fired her at the state’s insistence.

In 2021, the newspaper reported on the former Winners Primary School in west Orange where a teacher had been arrested on accusations of soliciting sexually explicit videos from a student. The complaint file helped document high teacher turnover, shoddy employee vetting procedures and the hiring of at least 10 teachers without college degrees as well as concerns about student safety and poor-quality academics.

“Someone needs to visit the school and see what takes place there,” wrote a parent who filed a complaint in 2019.

The school, which has since changed its name to Providence Christian Preparatory School, remains in the state voucher program, with about 170 students using scholarships, bringing in more than $570,000. The former teacher pleaded no contest to the use of a child in a sexual performance, a second-degree felony, last year.

The Sentinel’s attorney, Rachel Fugate, said she is continuing to negotiate with the department. “I’m still hopeful we reach a resolution that provides the Sentinel access to these meaningful documents at a reasonable cost,” she added.

Inflating cost estimates blocks access to records, discourages members of the public from making requests and interferes with the democratic process, Barfield said.

“We call them ‘public’ records because they belong to the public,” she said.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Education Industry, Failure, Florida, Freedom of the Press, Religion, Separation of church and state, Shame, Vouchers

Fabiola Santiago: DeSantis Hates Immigrants Too

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2023 //
14

Fabiola Santiago is a wonderful columnist who writes for the Miami Herald. Whenever I read her opinions, I find myself vigorously agreeing. In this column, she wrote about DeSsntis’s spiteful treatment of immigrants, which is abetted by people who were immigrants or the children of immigrants. Florida, once known for its diversity, is rapidly becoming a stronghold of white and Christian supremacy (DeSantis appeals to Jews in Florida by his devotion to Israel, which also pleases evangelical Christians). Santiago notes that DeSantis will harass businesses that hire undocumented immmigrants (think hotels, restaurants, farms), but exclude businesses owned by his donors. Sounds like fertile ground for a shakedown: contribute to the DeSantis campaign and avoid prosecution.

Santiago wrote recently:

Immigrant-hate-stoking Florida Gov. DeSantis should be persona non grata in South Florida. But gullible voters eagerly follow charlatans.

There are plenty of reasons to whisk away the welcome mat — DeSantis has attacked practically every distinctive feature we once stood for — none more repulsive than his loathing of undocumented immigrants, encapsulated in an immigration bill making its way through the Legislature.

This is a region risen from the tears and triumphs of decades of immigration, and BD — Before DeSantis — even Republican politicians held us up as an example of the heights a diverse community can reach.

Before the abhorrent “Florida blueprint” DeSantis is peddling nationwide — autocracy, anti-gay, anti-Black and anti-women’s rights, anti-immigrant measures — we were heralded as America’s model city of the future.

Now, GOP state lawmakers stand in solidarity with inconceivable intrusion in our communities by a governor with runaway ambition.

Simply put, both versions of the same proposal, House Bill 1617 and Senate Bill 1718, are a slap to the face of our immigrant families — and native-born Americans who have welcomed immigrants into their lives, whether through friendship or marriage.

Families of mixed immigration status, people who straddle two worlds, are a Florida trademark. But if bills pass both chambers, these Floridians could potentially become criminals in the eyes of the law.

If signed by the governor, the new and possibly unconstitutional law would criminalize hosting immigrants in your home and driving them to school, work or anywhere else.

Doing so would be paramount to harboring a fugitive and abetting them. Who and how authorities get to decide who is here illegally or who isn’t is tough to tell.

And neither DeSantis nor the state decides immigration matters. The bill also mandates random raids on businesses to check employees’ immigration status, again not the purview of state government, and forces hospitals to ask patients for their immigration status.

All of these proposals, which should have been dead on arrival when filed, have passed two House and Senate committees.

The consequences of this bill are far reaching for people living in big Florida cities, such as Hialeah — which has the largest concentration of immigrants in the country — and obviously, other Miami-Dade and Broward cities. The same is true for other immigrant hubs, such as Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville, where immigrant advocates held protests recently.

“This bill will negatively impact not only tens of thousands of mixed-status families living in Florida but will also impact thousands of businesses across the state,“ former Miami congresswoman Debbie Mucarsel-Powell told me.

“Immigrants have been the backbone of Florida’s economy from the agricultural sector to the hospitality industry. Will Gov. DeSantis raid every business in the state to enforce this law?”

Perhaps not the businesses of his donors, but he will target those of random Hispanics and other minority groups. It’s a political game for the governor with his sights on the presidency.

To win the Republican primary, DeSantis has to outdo former President Trump’s immigrant loathing. Who could have imagined that even possible?

But here’s DeSantis vying to prove to the base that he’s the baddest boy on the extremist Republican right-wing block. And he will boast on the campaign trail, as he likes to say: “Florida delivers results.”

To accomplish his legislative goals, DeSantis misrepresents the nation’s true immigration picture.

He attacks the Biden administration falsely claiming the president is allowing an “open border” when Biden is turning away, repatriating and deporting immigrants at a rate immigration advocates have denounced as “Trump-like.”

But perhaps worse than a Christian nationalist governor’s xenophobia, ethically speaking, is the fact that these bills that hurt immigrant communities are moving along with “yea” votes from Republican Cuban Americans from Miami-Dade. Have they lost all sense of decency?

To see senators with the last names of García and Rodríguez, the children of Cuban exiles, voting to do harm to other immigrants is beyond shameful. Sen. Ana Maria Rodríguez, who chairs the Miami-Dade Delegation, voted to pass the bill out of the Rules Committee.

It’s incomprehensible that she represents Doral, the city known as “Doralzuela” for its huge Venezuelan community.

But, for this generation — as Cuban-American Lt. Gov. Jeanette Núñez also has demonstrated with her support of DeSantis’ deceitful transport of immigrants to other states — it’s OK to reject one’s heritage. It’s the price of admission to the 1950s-styled Tallahassee club of powerful white men and compliant women.

Maybe Rodríguez’s inner child doesn’t remember how our parents housed with pride and warmth the latest newcomer from Cuba — whether the arrival came visa in hand through the Freedom Flights or aboard a packed shrimper, and without papers, on the Mariel boatlift.

But I remember when the first Hispanic caucus went to Tallahassee for one purpose: to represent us. Now the heirs jauntily walk in the shoes of an immigrant hater and do his bidding without regard to the impact on our communities? They’re weak legislators riding coattails that are a bad fit for immigrant South Florida.

Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/fabiola-santiago/article274039665.html#storylink=cpy

Categories Bigotry, Cruelty, DeSantis, Extremism, Florida
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »