By Jack Forrest, CNN Published 7:45 AM EDT, Fri March 17, 2023
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis answers questions from the media in the Florida Cabinet following his “State of the State” address during a joint session of the Florida Senate and House of Representatives at the Florida State Capitol in Tallahassee, Florida, on March 7, 2023.
CNN — A federal appeals court on Thursday ruled that a temporary block on a portion of a law pushed by Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis restricting what can be taught in Florida’s public colleges and universities will remain in place.
The three-judge panel of the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request from the DeSantis administration and officials with the state university system to stay an injunction from US District Judge Mark Walker, who called the law “positively dystopian” in a 138-page order, while the case plays out.
Last April, DeSantis signed into law Florida’s Individual Freedom Act, better known as the “Stop WOKE Act,” but it has faced a number of legal challenges since taking effect on July 1. The law is a key component of DeSantis’ war on “woke ideology,” and was intended to prevent teachings or mandatory workplace activities that suggest a person is privileged or oppressed based necessarily on their race, color, sex or national origin.
With the law, Walker wrote in November that Florida “lays the cornerstone of its own Ministry of Truth under the guise of the Individual Freedom Act” – invoking George Orwell’s novel, “1984.”
“The Court did not rule on the merits of our appeal. The appeal is ongoing, and we remain confident that the law is constitutional,” DeSantis’ spokesman Bryan Griffin said in a statement.
The Legal Defense Fund, which represented the plaintiffs in the case, celebrated the decision.
“Institutions of higher education in Florida should have the ability to provide a quality education, which simply cannot happen when students and educators, including Black students and educators, feel they cannot speak freely about their lived experiences, or when they feel that they may incur a politician’s wrath for engaging in a fact-based discussion of our history,” Alexsis Johnson, assistant counsel of The Legal Defense Fund, said in a statement.
Opponents of the law are fighting it on three fronts: the law’s effects on K-12, higher education and employers.
Last August, Walker granted an injunction filed by two Florida-based employers, who wanted to require diversity and inclusion trainings for staff, and a consultant who provides such training. Walker at the time called the law “upside down” when it comes to the First Amendment because it allows the state to burden freedom of speech.
CNN’s Joe Sutton, Sabrina Clay, Nicquel Terry Ellis, Steve Contorno and Kit Maher contributed to this report.
If we all could see the world through the eyes of a child, we would see the magic in everything….
Let's bring that magic back...
Today’s times for our precious children are so challenging…Here in Florida, the divisiveness of our political climate because of Governor Ron DeSantis…
Retired now eight years, I feel my passion for our children more than ever…
I was doing my weekly shopping at my go to store “Walmart”…
A happeningstore…Wherein my teacher past, Walmart and Dollar Tree helped furnish my school treats and prizes...
Waiting in a very long line… Because Walmart, now does not hire enough cashiers, only for more profits…The sign of these times…
The young cashier was doing all he could do, doing his job… Admitting to me, he now makes $16 an hour…I told him… He should be making $20!!!
While the very long wait and our frustration, I did have a blessed opportunity to talk with the lovely black woman behind me, also wearing a mask…
I was pleasantly surprised to find out she was a teacher for over forty years!! Teaching in a small community here in Flagler County…She had taught first grade, like myself, for many years, and was presently the school librarian… teaching four days a week…
I was surprised to learn that being a Republican leaning district, she reticently did reveal that the current divisive political policies have not affected her library… We did not elaborate…
However…she did share, Our precious children, are acting out more…They are dealing with so much…
Governor of Florida Ron DeSantis visits Pio Hot Bagels in Staten Island, New York on February 20, 2023.
Gov. Ron DeSantis wants Florida’s K-12 educators to do as they’re told… On top of low pay, difficulties in securing long-term contracts, the stress of high-stakes testing, and increases in student mental health issues, public school teachers must stick to the governor’s conservative script or risk being fired..
That script includes the Parental Rights in Education Act, colloquially known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law, the Stop WOKE Act, and the recent statewide ban on College Board’s Advanced Placement African American studies curriculum.
These developments have contributed to the highest teacher vacancy rate in the country by creating a climate of paranoia that has exasperated many teachers, chased others out of the profession entirely, and deterred aspiring educators. Culture-war turmoil combined with the pandemic era’s tight labor market means that Florida and most Deep South states have struggled to recruit teachers. When the far-right Republican became governor in 2019, there were 2,217 vacant teacher positions in Florida. As of early January, there were about 5,300 openings statewide, with an additional 4,631 support staff openings (excluding Miami-Dade County), the Florida Education Association told the Prospect.
In 2022, Florida allocated an additional $250 million over the previous fiscal year to increase teacher salaries. While the funding boosted the base salary for new teachers to $47,500, the pay increase for experienced teachers did not even cover cost-of-living increases. Overall, the pay raise bumped the state up from 49th to 48th in average teacher pay nationwide, according to the National Education Association. DeSantis has proposed $200 million in more funding for teacher pay in his fiscal 2023-2024 budget, which according to the FEA, will hardly move the needle. “Pay in the third-largest state can and should rank in the top 10 nationally,” FEA President Andrew Spar said in a statement.
More from Luca GoldMansour
Florida’s vacancy issue has its roots in the state’s decades-long role as a laboratory for the right’s assault on public education, with its Republican governors playing key parts. Former Gov. Jeb Bush made school choice and high-stakes standardized testing his signature issues in the 2000s, before his brother President George W. Bush took “reforms” like the No Child Left Behind Act to the White House. DeSantis’s predecessor, Rick Scott, now the state’s junior senator, also expanded charter schools and voucher programs while chipping away at long-term contracts for teachers. But DeSantis has not only built on his predecessors’ devotion to privatization and exploitative salaries, he has also squelched teaching, learning, and productive dialogues on American history, race, and gender.
The teacher shortages exhaust the remaining educators, and buttress DeSantis’ conservative takeover of public-school curriculums by whittling down institutional resistance to his culture-war inspired edicts. Educators are “frustrated to the point where they don’t have a sense of hope anymore,” said Steve Frazier, Executive Director of the Florida League of Middle Schools, who worked as a teacher and principal in Broward County for over three decades. “It’s like anything, you keep getting beat down, eventually you just wave the white flag and say I can’t do it anymore.”
Florida’s vacancy issue has its roots in the state’s decades-long role as a laboratory for the right’s assault on public education, with its Republican governors playing key parts. Former Gov. Jeb Bush made school choice and high-stakes standardized testing his signature issues in the 2000s, before his brother President George W. Bush took “reforms” like the No Child Left Behind Act to the White House. DeSantis’s predecessor, Rick Scott, now the state’s junior senator, also expanded charter schools and voucher programs while chipping away at long-term contracts for teachers. But DeSantis has not only built on his predecessors’ devotion to privatization and exploitative salaries, he has also squelched teaching, learning, and productive dialogues on American history, race, and gender.
The teacher shortages exhaust the remaining educators, and buttress DeSantis’ conservative takeover of public-school curriculums by whittling down institutional resistance to his culture-war inspired edicts. Educators are “frustrated to the point where they don’t have a sense of hope anymore,” said Steve Frazier, Executive Director of the Florida League of Middle Schools, who worked as a teacher and principal in Broward County for over three decades. “It’s like anything, you keep getting beat down, eventually you just wave the white flag and say I can’t do it anymore.”
Tawanda Carter, a literacy coach in Broward County for 23 years, took a classroom position this year because of the shortages. To support her students in the long run, Carter realized that she must pick and choose her battles to avoid burnout, especially when a parent objects to certain topics like learning about the experiences of other racial and ethnic groups. “At the end of the day, I recognize in myself and others that you just do what you can do,” she says.
Teacher vacancies also give DeSantis and Florida state lawmakers an opportunity to seed schools with instructors whom they believe would be more amenable to far-right positions. Under Florida’s Military Veterans Certification Pathway program, which came into effect on July 1 of last year, veterans with at least four years of service, an honorable or medical discharge, 60 college credits, and a minimum 2.5 GPA can apply for a temporary teaching certificate after passing a subject-area exam of their choice.
Florida teachers should have the leeway to design appropriate lesson plans for their students and not be shackled to politically imposed curriculums…
New teachers hired under the program are assigned a mentor teacher for at least two years, and will have five years to fulfill the requirements for permanent certification, including obtaining a bachelor’s degree. Many experienced educators worry that the program will not help fill vacancies but instead lower the standards for people entering the profession. DeSantis has also proposed offering bonuses to veterans and retired first responders who agree to teach full-time for at least two years. Such recruitment drives are a disservice to veterans and first responders seeking second careers, as well as to current students and teachers. The state has processed hundreds of applications, but only twelve veterans have been hired so far, the Florida Department of Education told the Prospect.
Herman Bennett, a historian of the African diaspora at the City University of New York, helped the College Board draft the African American Studies AP curriculum. He says the Florida moves remind him that fifty years ago a teacher’s credentials were irrelevant for some schools. “It’s reminiscent of what history teaching once was in my generation, there was the idea that the historian could be the football coach,” he says. “Because it really didn’t matter. You could have a knucklehead who was responsible for the civics course.”
For Bennett, DeSantis’s rejection of the College Board’s African American studies course signals the debasing of teaching and learning loud and clear. “If the AP course was simply Black names, dates and facts, DeSantis wouldn’t have a concern about it because that would just produce an inert and passive citizen.” Bennett said. “Afro-American studies demonstrate that there are histories of struggle, and if you don’t have those understandings, then you see the possibility of change as limited.”
With the College Board caving into DeSantis’s demands, the state’s educators can only do so much to get around these obstacles. By removing African American and other racial, ethnic, and gender studies topics from public school curriculums, and diluting discussions of contemporary issues like Black Lives Matter, another Republican governor is once again trying to export new limitations on learning across the country. Florida teachers should have the leeway to design appropriate lesson plans for their students and not be shackled to politically imposed curriculums. Stifling creativity in classroom instruction ultimately means that teachers can only teach exactly what they are told to teach and nothing more—if they decide to stay in the profession at all
The Florida Department of Education releasing a list of approved books, but spelling “ninth” and “twelfth” wrong on the document, is the most Florida thing I have seen… pic.twitter.com/tDfvLFXPMc
The big story: Florida’s dispute with the College Board continued to broaden, with Gov. Ron DeSantis’ suggestions that perhaps the state can do without the organization’s courses and exams beginning to take shape.
Top state officials said they had been in conversations with Classic Learning Test — developed in part by DeSantis appointee to the New College board of trustees Mark Bauerlein — to implement that exam as an alternate to the College Board’s SAT. The Classic Learning Test supporters tout it as being focused on the “great classical and Christian tradition,” a movement that has been gaining traction in some charter and private school circles…
A move away from the College Board would not come without consequences. Tens of thousands of teens take Advanced Placement courses annually with the hope of earning college-level credits. They also take the group’s SAT test to help them earn university entrance and Bright Futures scholarship eligibility. Here are four things to know as the state ponders the role of the College Board.
The discussion about the organization’s future in Florida arose as an offshoot of DeSantis’ objections to some of the content in the proposed AP African American studies course. He called for changes before he would allow the Department of Education to consider approving it for use in Florida’s public schools. Much of the dispute centered on key ideas and phrases that have become politicized. The Washington Post examines how the course language changed over time.
Four other states now are reviewing whether the course meets their policies and laws on teaching about race, Axios reports.
The argument has become much more than academic. Black leaders and activists are vowing to take to the streets to fight against what they view as DeSantis’ assault on civil rights. The conservatives are standing firm in their effort to advance a counter-revolution and purge what they call “woke-ness” out of the schools, government and society…
The Rev. Al Sharpton speaks to a crowd of hundreds from the steps of the Senate portico during the National Action Network demonstration in response to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ rejection of a high school African American history course, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2023 in Tallahassee, Fla…
Some people have asked whether DeSantis took any AP courses while attending Dunedin High. The Daily Beast published a page from his yearbook indicating that he was given an AP American History Award in 1996…
(Alicia Devine /Tallahassee Democrat via AP) [ ALICIA DEVINE | AP ] staff
I was recently summoned to serve on jury duty here in my community, Flagler County…I felt it would be my responsibility as a citizen and a privilege…
Never visiting our court house, Arriving at around 8:00 AM…I was screened by the officers on duty, who were all to be welcoming and appreciative…
The judge from the Seventh Circuit met us in a preliminary room where he spent a great deal of time going over our schedule and responsibilities… He said we may be there for 2 to 3 days…He was extremely knowledgeable and appreciative that we were there to serve…
There were about 25 of us, about 17 white men, and 8 female, one of whom was the only black… several Hispanic, one Asian…
We were then escorted to the Hearing room where all attorneys were present…A white, female prosecutor; and at the defense table 2 males, one of whom was black… Learning, one was the public defender and the other was the defendant, a young black male…
What struck me so, not having any previous knowledge about this case…Since both males were wearing suits, I assumed, at first, the black male was another attorney...
This is not how he looked during the trial…He did have a suit on, however his hair was uncovered…And he had affect…
How wrong I was…He was the defendant…My impression was, he definitely could have been one of my students…What went wrong in his life that led him to this place in his life?
I was so relieved that I was not chosen to be part of this jury…All 7 were white, with one being a female…
My heart breaks for our children…
Jury did find him guilty of the charges…
He is in for life…for his orevious crime and there is an appeal pending..This current crime will Just add more time to a life sentence for his crimes…Where there was no loss of life…
Janis Sexton...Teacher...Advocate 