Florida counties are working to comply with a statute that mandates the approval of books in classroom libraries and was supported by the Republican governor Ron DeSantis.
According to Pat Barber, president of the Manatee Education Association, the county’s teachers’ union, teachers in the Manatee County School District are feeling “fear” and “confusion” as the district works to implement HB 1467, which mandates that books be pre-approved materials or vetted by a media specialist trained by the Florida Department of Education.
According to a district-provided document outlining new statutory amendments to HB 1467, breaches may be considered third-degree felonies.
When instructors provide school libraries for their pupils to foster a love of reading, Barber told CNN, “It’s abhorrent to me that their good deed may potentially result in a criminal.”
A June document states that the books clause, which DeSantis signed into law last year, demands that library media resources be authorized by a “school district employee who carries a certified educational media specialist credential.”
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The choice of library materials, including classroom libraries, must be “free of Pornography” and legally prohibited material, “suited to student needs and their ability to comprehend the material presented,” and “appropriate for the grade level and age group,” according to Florida’s Department of Education, which was issuing guidance memos as recently as December.
“If a teacher (or any adult) deliberately distributes obscene material, such as pictures showing sexual activity, sexual battery, bestiality, or sadomasochistic abuse, they could be charged with a felony.
Who could object to that? Manny Diaz Jr., the commissioner of education for Florida, defended the legislation in a tweet on Wednesday.
The controversial rule is just one of many initiatives supported by DeSantis to dictate what can be taught in Florida schools; this public position has increased his national profile as he reportedly considers running for president in 2024.
The state rejected a new proposed AP course on African American studies last week for imposing what the governor referred to as a “political agenda,” and this was the governor’s first comment on the subject.
CNN has contacted DeSantis’ office for comment.
At a meeting of the school board on Tuesday, Marie Masferrer from the Florida Association for Media in Education requested that books be made available to kids in the classrooms. At the same time, other resources are being compiled and reviewed. While the process was still possible, she said, “Open up the classroom libraries.”
Don Falls, a government and economics teacher at Manatee High School, told CNN that teachers were instructed to box up their classroom libraries, cover them, or catalog the books in the district’s cataloging system to verify their approval and maintain them on shelves. He decided to use chart paper to cover his books.
“I believe that hiding them makes a bigger statement. When my pupils questioned me about the situation, I told them about the limitations that the state had set on the books that came from the district, though I did not go into great depth, said Falls, a teacher in the community for 38 years.
He said that I don’t have the time, nor do I think I should, to go through all these volumes and enter them into the system. It is profoundly wrong to my First Amendment rights and the rights of my students.
According to Laurie Breslin, executive director of curriculum for the Manatee County School District, some teachers may have chosen to restrict access to books because they lacked time to catalog their classroom libraries and confirm whether the titles are pre-approved.
However, according to Breslin, teachers are permitted to provide pupils with pre-approved reading materials, and students can access the school’s main library’s collection of books.
Chad Choate III, the school board chair, explained that this was done to safeguard the instructors rather than impose a book ban.
Republican-controlled states like Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, and Texas have pushed for statewide regulations that make it simpler for detractors to remove books they don’t like from school libraries in every community, unlike the traditional battles over access to controversial books, which have been fought district by district and even school by school.
The school system in Manatee County told CNN that it is currently “cataloging” books in classrooms to ensure that it is in line with the law.
Kevin Chapman, the chief of staff for the Manatee County School District, said volunteers collaborate with teachers to create a list of books in classrooms and verify whether books are included in a database of vetted resources. He noted that if the book has not been approved, a skilled media specialist must review it.
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According to Chapman, during a meeting last week, the district briefed principals about how it intended to execute the new law. He asserted that while he was unaware of any books that had been pulled since the meeting last week, they had been removed since the start of the academic year because they were deemed improper.
He said that we want them to be correct because we know this will be a process. It’s a significant undertaking.
Chapman responded, “The School District of Manatee is only adhering by the law,” when asked to address opponents who claim the procedure amounts to censorship.
School administrators in Pinellas County, Florida, said they were attempting to align their rules with the statutory standards during another school board meeting on Tuesday night. According to Dan Evans, associate superintendent of teaching and learning services, 94 book titles were examined over the summer “for age appropriateness” by a team of library media professionals.
According to Evans, the school district implemented the process and goes “above what the law mandates.” “That team did recommend 10 titles to be weeded out of our collections or moved to our adult-only resource library,” Evans said.
