ORLANDO, Fla. — Florida adopted a trio of education rules Wednesday that carry out its new culture-war laws, including one that threatens public school teachers with the loss of state certification if they violate requirements of the state’s so-called “don’t say gay” and “anti-woke” legislation.
More than 50 people spoke at the State Board of Education meeting held at an Orlando hotel, both to denounce and applaud the new rules, all of which were adopted.
The laws were approved earlier this year by the Republican-dominated Florida Legislature and then signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, who pushed for their passage. The seven members of the state board are all appointees of DeSantis or his Republican predecessor, and in a press release after the meeting called the rules “groundbreaking” and applauded the new laws that prompted them.
“Today we joined to uphold the right of parents to raise their children as they best see fit,” said Tom Grady, the board’s chair, in a statement. “The rules and amendments we approved will support the safety of students and ensure Florida continues to provide high-quality education to every child.”
The state’s new Parental Rights in Education Law, the one opponents call “don’t say gay,” prevents instruction in sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through third grade. The new Individual Freedom law, the one DeSantis dubbed his “anti-woke” measure, prohibits teaching that anyone of one race is responsible for past acts committed by someone of that same race, among other prohibitions.
The new rule bars teachers from “intentionally” providing instruction the laws forbid. If they do, they could face “revocation or suspension” of their license to teach.
Critics said the rule unfairly attacks gay and transgender people by suggesting they aim to sexualize children and makes it hard for teachers who want to be accepting of students who live in families with same-sex parents.
“Teachers shouldn’t be punished or silenced for valuing every family,” Rindala Alajaji, with Equality Florida, the statewide LGBTQ civil rights group, told the board.
Others said the instruction state leaders feared wasn’t happening.
“With rules like this, you’re going after public school teachers, accusing us of perpetrating some socialist elitist agenda,” said Carmela DeToma, a 30-year veteran who teaches at Colonial High School in Orange County. “This is just a tired old tactic of creating a problem where there is none.”
DeToma, noting few teachers could attend the 9 a.m. meeting, asked for more time than the allotted minute and was escorted out by security when she continued to speak past that limit.
“When we teach American history, we don’t point fingers and lay blame on the young faces before us,” as the “anti-woke” law suggests, DeToma said in the statement she prepared for the meeting and shared later with the Orlando Sentinel. “We are not the ones indoctrinating anyone.”
Another woman told the board her mother — a Polk County teacher, an evangelical Christian and a Republican — was voting for Democrats this year because of the “fear and frustration” about these new laws and the “possibility of her license being revoked.”
But supporters of the new rule, including one board member, said teachers should face consequences if they violate the new law.
“Yes, they should lose their license,” said Tiffany Justice, a founder of Moms for Liberty, a conservative group that supports DeSantis’ education agenda.
“If we have activist teachers who are breaking the law, they need to be handled and they should not be in our classrooms teaching our children,” said Justice, a former Indian River County School Board member.
“There are some bad apples,” agreed board member Grazie Christie. “If children are hearing about sexuality in kindergarten then that needs to be addressed.”
The two other rules that prompted controversy and discussion were:
— One that requires school districts to alert parents if school bathrooms or lockers are separated “according to some criteria other than biological sex at birth.”
Opponents said it unfairly vilifies transgender youth. Supporters said it provides “transparency” to parents who are fearful bathroom rules to accommodate transgender students endanger girls.
— Another that says classroom libraries are part of the new requirements that elementary school libraries must make their collections searchable on a website.
Proponents said the rule meets the law’s intent of making sure parents can look up all books available at their children’s school. Critics said it puts an unfair burden on teachers, who must now catalog their collections and, overwhelmed with that work, may just pack them up and take them home, leading to a “book desert” in some schools.
The rule on bathrooms does not dictate school bathroom policies for transgender students but does require that parents be notified if the school district adopts such a policy, which opponents said singles out transgender students and “puts targets on their back.“
They also said transgender children are not a threat and do not seek to use bathrooms that align with their identity for nefarious purposes.
“Bathroom issues are not a thing and quite frankly never have been,” said Alison Holmes, a Seminole County mother who spoke against that rule.
“You are putting kids at risk. It’s ugly and it’s cruel,” said another woman.
But others urged the board to approve the new rule, saying without it they feared for their girls and a loss of privacy.
There has been an “erosion of girls’ rights” and forcing them to share bathrooms or lockers and “undress in front of a biological male is wrong,” said Nivia Claussen, with the Sarasota County chapter of Moms for Liberty.
In their press release, board members applauded the classroom library rule saying it was “eliminating inappropriate, indoctrinating and pornographic materials” from public schools.
Jacob Oliva, who oversees K-12 education at the Florida Department of Education, said classroom libraries were included in the rule because some feared that teachers would use their class collections to provide books not allowed in the library.
He said it was not the state’s intent to eliminate classroom libraries.
“That is the last thing we would ever want,” Oliva said, noting he is a former elementary school teacher and principal.
School media specialists and other library advocates spoke against the rule, however, saying cataloging would be too time consuming.
“Teachers do not have the time or the resources to do this,” one media specialist said.
“You are essentially shutting down thousands of classroom libraries,” said Stephana Ferrell, a co-founder of the Florida Freedom to Read Project, which opposes efforts to ban or limit books in schools.
Her sons, both in elementary school in Orange County, get to visit their school library only once every two weeks but use their teachers’ classroom libraries almost daily. If a few parents are worried, “do a parental opt out for the classroom library,” she said, but do not limit access to books for everyone else’s children.
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