The Florida State Board of Education will soon make a decision on an anti-indoctrination rule that will change the way U.S. History is taught in public schools.
The rule aims to establish strict guidelines for U.S. History that will try to eliminate students being indoctrinated by teachers by taking subjectivity out of the curriculum and focusing on facts that do not distort significant historical events.
Under the proposed rule, discussions held within the classroom must be considered appropriate for the different age and maturity levels of students that aligns with their specific grade level. During classroom discussion, teachers are prohibited from sharing their personal opinions and will be encouraged to let students develop their own perspective without influence or persuasion from the teacher’s point of view.
Richard Corcoran, the Commissioner of the Board of Education in Florida, spoke at Hillsdale College in early May where he stressed the importance of the proposed rule and how it fits within the new B.E.S.T. (Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking) standards that replaced the unpopular Common Core standards. “We’re passing a rule this coming month that says, for the 185,000 teachers, you can’t indoctrinate students with stuff that’s not based on our standards, the new B.E.S.T. standards,” said Corcoran, alluding to his description of the former standards being influenced by “crazy liberal stuff.”
Along with the B.E.S.T. standards, the proposed rule also comes from Governor DeSantis’ attempt to eradicate critical race theory in classrooms. Critical race theory focuses on how the nation’s history of racism plays an institutional part of American society and how it can be seen today. DeSantis stated, “It’s basically teaching kids to hate our country and to hate each other based on race. It puts race as the most important thing. I want content of character to be the most important thing.”
The state of Florida’s largest teachers union, the Florida Education Association, opposed the proposal with union President Andrew Spar stating the new standards purposely leaves out significant racial events and that it needs to be amended to include events or time periods such as the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the Jim Crow era.
The Florida Board of Education will vote on the proposed rule June 10th, and if approved, will only affect public schools.
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Casey Owens is a writer at The Florida Capital Star. Follow him on Twitter at @cowensreports. Email tips to [email protected].
