Florida Teachers Spend Their Summer Struggling With DeSantis Book Ban
Educators must get lists of titles reviewed; at least one has to cart home 300 volumes
Florida Gov Ron DeSantis has ensured that teachers in his state aren't enjoying their time this summer.
That's because educators in the Sunshine State have been busy complying with the dizzying number of regulations restricting what Floridian students can read, instituted by DeSantis and the Republican-dominated state legislature.
For DeSantis, who is battling frontrunner Donald Trump for the Republican nomination for president, it's all part of his “war on woke.”
But it's Florida teachers — and ultimately the pupils whom they teach — who are ultimately paying the price.
The nation has seen a surge in book bans over the past two years as parents, conservative activists, and elected officials have flooded school districts with requests to wipe scores of titles from classrooms and libraries — with Florida still leading the pack in such incidents.
While DeSantis denies he is trying to ban books, others have called him out for doing just that.
A teacher at an Orlando, Fla., charter school, who identifies herself on social media as Courtney, started a bit of an online bitch session among Florida's educators when she tweeted about her experiences this summer complying with the state's new regulations on which books could be allowed in classrooms.
“Just found out we won’t be allowed personal libraries in our classroom this year. That means I have like 300 books to bring home now. I’m devastated. That was always the most important part of my classroom,” she posted in a tweet Monday, which was liked nearly 7,000 times.
Third-grade teacher Erika Pettet commiserated, replying, “I work in Florida. We have to catalog and vett the books through the county. Then, the list will be provided to parents.
“It's a lot of work so it's tempting to just scrap it. But I feel like it's worth it to a least try.”
Courtney responded, “I had my list ready to be vetted and everything. But the county I guess doesn’t want to vett charters too? Or they don’t have enough staff for charters? It’s so frustrating. I’ve spent a lot of my summer trying to convince my principal to let us keep them too.”
Rick Fletcher, a retired chemistry professor in Idaho, chimed in to denounce book bans.
“This is so wrong. Individual parents or even groups should not be permitted to control access. They have every right to preview the books and identify which texts they don’t want their child reading, but that is much different from removing all access,” he tweeted, with Pettet responding: “Well, I'm curious how the parental objection process will work. Who makes the final decision? Is the teacher at risk of loosing [sic] their job?
“I feel pretty good about my books but am I willing to loose [sic] my job over objections to Go Dog Go?”
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