Thanks to the Governor’s leadership, Florida is the most pro-parent, pro-student state in the nation. His policies ensure that every student in Florida has the opportunity to get a quality education. The Governor has provided historic levels of investment in Florida’s K-12 schools, colleges, and universities. Because of this, Florida’s ranking for K-12 student achievement is 3rd in the nation, according to Education Week’s Quality Counts 2021 Report. Florida also ranks 1st in the nation for higher education, according to the U.S. News and World Report.
PUTTING KIDS FIRST AND PROTECTING PARENTS’ RIGHTS
- Keep Schools Open and Reject Lockdowns
- Educate, Don’t Indoctrinate
- Ensure Parental Rights in Education and Keep Woke Gender Ideology Out of Schools
- Support Robust Civics Education
- Expand Workforce Development and Technical Education
- Reject the Use of Critical Race Theory (CRT) in the Curriculum
- Increase Teacher Pay
- Continue Support for School Security and Mental Health Initiatives
- Protect the Right of Parents to Petition School Boards and Districts for Redress of Grievances
- Guarantee the Right of Parents to Curriculum Transparency
PRIORITIZING STUDENTS
Florida led the way by putting students’ needs first. In the summer of 2020, when the media and teachers’ unions advocated lockdowns, Governor DeSantis kept our schools open. As a result, millions of students in Florida did not experience the same learning loss as locked-down states.
“It seems that the shifts to remote or hybrid instruction during 2020-21 had profound consequences for student achievement. In districts that went remote, achievement growth was lower for all subgroups, but especially for students attending high-poverty schools.”
May 2022 Study by Harvard’s Center for Education Policy Research titled The Consequences of Remote and Hybrid Instruction During the Pandemic
PARENTAL RIGHTS
Governor DeSantis protected parental rights in education:
- Banned classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender ideology for K-3rd grade
- Signed the Parents’ Bill of Rights, prohibiting the state, or any other governmental entity, from infringing on a parent’s ability to decide what is best for their child
- Required school districts to notify parents if there is a change in their child’s mental, emotional, or physical well-being
- Ensured school districts are transparent in the selection of curriculum materials, including library books and reading materials
- Prohibited school districts from force masking students
“In Florida, we are taking a stand against the state-sanctioned racism that is Critical Race Theory. We won’t allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country or to hate each other.”
Governor Ron DeSantis