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Florida and DeSantis dig in as criticism of Black history curriculum mounts

The teaching standards have again thrust Florida and DeSantis into America’s politically polarized fight over how and what to teach children.

By ANDREW ATTERBURY

Florida officials are digging in and defending the state’s new standards for teaching Black history amid continued widespread criticism on Monday, including threats of possible legal action from a group of civil and religious leaders.

Black leaders and Democrats — and some Republicans — are using the issue to hammer Gov. Ron DeSantis and his White House ambitions, specifically targeting the new standards that require middle schoolers to be instructed that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

The DeSantis administration, meanwhile, is attempting to characterize criticisms of the history standards as dishonest and a political stunt perpetrated by Democrats like Vice President Kamala Harris to tarnish Florida.

The teaching standards have again thrust Florida and DeSantis into America’s politically polarized fight over how and what to teach children. Republicans have praised DeSantis and state education officials for supporting controversial education measures, including pushing Florida’s Parental Rights in Education law, known by opponents as “Don’t Say Gay,” restricting lessons on race and banning colleges and universities from spending on many diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Democrats and civil rights groups, however, have demonized the governor and Florida over such bills and have threatened boycotts of the state.

“He’s not going to rewrite and redefine Black history, not while we’re still alive,” Rev. R.B. Holmes Jr., pastor of Bethel Missionary Baptist Church in Tallahassee, told reporters Monday at an event condemning the teaching standards.

The new teaching standards, approved unanimously last week by Florida’s Board of Education, are the latest attempt by state leaders to regulate how students learn about race in public schools. They were crafted by a Florida Department of Education workgroup to match the so-called Stop WOKE Act, something specifically requested by DeSantis in 2022 to target lessons over issues like “white privilege” by creating new protections for students and workers, including that a person should not be instructed to “feel guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress” due to their race, color, sex or national origin.

Touted by education officials for teaching the “good, the bad and the ugly” about American history and slavery, the standards were met with immediate criticism from Florida’s largest teachers union and other groups, attention that quickly gained steam nationally.

Much of the scrutiny surrounds a particular standard requiring middle school students to learn “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.” But there are also objections to lessons that classify acts of violence perpetrated “against and by” African Americans, like the Ocoee Massacre of 1920, when a white crowd burned Black homes and churches to the ground and killed Black residents in a small Florida town enraged by a Black man attempting to vote.

In the face of this mounting criticism, including Holmes and a coalition of Black faith leaders on Monday signaling intentions to rally and possibly pursue legal action, the DeSantis administration is showing no signs of changing the controversial new standards, even as the Republican governor defended the standards Friday during a stop in Utah and claimed that he “wasn’t involved in it.”

“These were scholars who put that together, it was not anything that was done politically,” DeSantis said.

To that end, the DeSantis administration has leaned on statements from two Black members of the history workgroup to defend the standards and swat away naysayers. The joint statement insisted that “any attempt to reduce slaves to just victims of oppression fails to recognize their strength, courage and resiliency during a difficult time in American history.”

The Florida Department of Education, as one defense, listed 16 examples of historic figures they say developed “highly specialized trades” that benefitted them after slavery, although several critics noted some people listed as examples were never enslaved. “It is the case that Africans proved resourceful, resilient and adaptive, and were able to develop skills and aptitudes which served to their benefit both while enslaved and after enslavement,” workgroup member William B. Allen, emeritus dean and former Professor of Political Philosophy in the Department of Political Science at Michigan State University, said in clips a DeSantis spokesperson posted on social media.

But those answers and explanations are doing little to quell opponents, who claim the standards are Florida “whitewashing” history lessons. Some, such as civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, fear that other states will be emboldened by Florida’s standards and enact similar policies. Speaking to reporters Monday, Crump, who came short of pledging to sue the DeSantis administration, claimed that the state’s “revisionist history” will cause “psychological trauma” for Black students.

“If we don’t bash this racist curriculum in the head like a snake, then I worry that it will manifest all across America,” Crump told reporters Monday.

The conflict over Florida’s history standards are similar to what unfolded when state Education Department officials earlier this year rejected the College Board’s African American studies AP program for initially including coursework on queer theory and other aspects it deemed objectionable, such as critical race theory.

In this case, too, the DeSantis administration was scorned by Black leaders, and Crump threatened to sue if students were blocked from taking the course.

The course, however, is still not being offered in Florida. But, in one key difference between the two issues, Florida and DeSantis are now taking heat from other Republicans. It comes at a difficult time for DeSantis’ campaign, which has struggled to gain traction amid frequent criticism from former President Donald Trump.

Two of DeSantis’ GOP presidential primary opponents, former Texas Rep. Will Hurd, who is Black, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who both publicly lambasted the new standards. Christie also targeted how the governor seemed to distance himself from the standards in Utah, claiming those “are not the words of leadership.”

“Governor DeSantis started this fire with the bill that he signed and now he doesn’t want to take responsibility for whatever is done in the aftermath of it, and from listening and watching his comments he’s obviously uncomfortable,” Christie said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”