Do Florida’s new African American History Standards “whitewash our history,” as claimed by the teachers’ union?

Updated at 5:15 p.m. on July 23 with additional quotes from Dr. William B. Allen.
BY JENNIFER CABRERA
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – At the July 18 Alachua County School Board meeting, Alachua County Education Association President Carmen Ward told the board that she had to leave the meeting early because she was driving down to Orlando to attend the July 19 State Board of Education meeting “to urge them not to whitewash our history in the state of Florida with the standards.”
School Board Chair Tina Certain said she had been “kind of reading some of that stuff, and I’m a little bit disturbed at how watered-down the standards that they’re putting forth are becoming, so just for the record: my ancestors and those who were enslaved, there was slavery. It was not indentured servitude, I’ve just gotta say that. That’s one of the things that they’re saying they will change–they won’t refer to it as slavery, it’ll be referred to as indentured servitude. And that’s an insult, I think, to everyone.”
At their July 19 meeting, the State Board of Education considered updates to the State Academic Standards for Social Studies that include a new K-12 strand for African American History, developed to align with statutory and State Board requirements. The standards, found here, add the African American History standards to the other Social Studies strands: Civics and Government, Holocaust Education, Financial Literacy, American History, World History, Humanities, Psychology, Geography, Economics, and Sociology.
The list of standards at the end of this article is lengthy, but most adults will learn something just by skimming them, and some version of the word “slave” appears 42 times in the standards listed below. Indentured servitude is also mentioned, but the emphasis is on contrasting indentured servitude with “race-based, hereditary slavery.”
Objections from the Vice President, the NAACP, and the FEA
Yesterday in Jacksonville, Vice President Kamala Harris said, “Just yesterday in the state of Florida, they decided middle school students will be taught that enslaved people benefited from slavery.”
A statement from the NAACP said, “The new standards convey a sanitized and dishonest telling of the history of slavery in America, suggesting that enslaved people developed skills that ‘could be applied for their personal benefit.'”
The Florida Education Association‘s (FEA) statement said the standards are “a disservice to Florida’s students and are a big step backward for a state that has required teaching African American history since 1994.”
The FEA’s concerns include “conflat[ing] the 1920 Ocoee Massacre… with ‘acts of violence perpetrated by African Americans,'” but the wording in that standard is actually “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans.”
The FEA’s second concern is that the standards “require middle school students to be taught that the experience of slavery was beneficial to African Americans because it helped them acquire skills.” However, the standard says that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”
“It is disappointing, but nevertheless unsurprising, that critics would reduce months of work to create Florida’s first ever stand-alone strand of African American History Standards to a few isolated expressions without context.” – statement from Dr. William Allen and Dr. Frances Presley Rice
Dr. William B. Allen and Dr. Frances Presley Rice, members of Florida’s African American History Standards Workgroup, said in a statement, “The intent of this particular benchmark clarification is to show that some slaves developed highly specialized trades from which they benefited. This is factual and well documented.” They go on to list well-known blacksmiths, shoemakers, fishing and shipping industry workers, tailors, and teachers. “Any attempt to reduce slaves to just victims of oppression fails to recognize their strength, courage and resilience during a difficult time in American history. Florida students deserve to learn how slaves took advantage of whatever circumstances they were in to benefit themselves and the community of African descendants. It is disappointing, but nevertheless unsurprising, that critics would reduce months of work to create Florida’s first ever stand-alone strand of African American History Standards to a few isolated expressions without context.”
The FEA also expresses concern that “elementary school students are expected to be able to ‘identify’ famous African Americans… But their study of African American history does not extend to understanding these individuals’ histories and struggles.” However, as the standards below demonstrate, students are learning about the struggles of African Americans by fifth grade, with more detail added at each level of the standards.
Dr. Allen provided additional context to ABC News
ABC News aired an interview with Dr. Allen on July 22. In that interview, Allen was asked whether the wording should be amended, and he responded, “No, I do not. I think it would be effectively to erase people’s history, and let me illustrate that for you, if I may. My great-grandfather is someone who came from the islands and who was enslaved here, and whose own resilience, resourcefulness, and adaptiveness was certainly instrumental in producing for his family, his descendants, the ability to prosper here in this country. Hence, from his resourcefulness, we derive benefits. I think anyone who would try to change that language would be denying that [my] great-grandfather made any contribution. I certainly could not endorse doing that.”
“People don’t necessarily simply embrace their oppressors when they’re oppressed; they also react adaptively, and they find ways to make pathways for themselves, even in the presence of oppression.” – Dr. William B. Allen
When he was asked whether he had a message about the task force and the product it delivered to the State, he listed John Hope Franklin, Henry Louis Gates, Paul Finkelman, and David Hackett Fischer as authors whose work was used to develop the standards. He added, “I would ask people to bear in mind that when we talk about the resourcefulness of those people subject to the oppression of slavery, we’re not talking only about the United States. We’re talking about people worldwide, and particularly in the islands before they came, often to the United States, as well as those who came directly from Africa. We’re talking about the experience of oppression and how people respond to the experience of oppression, and we want people to recognize that there’s an opposite to Stockholm Syndrome. People don’t necessarily simply embrace their oppressors when they’re oppressed; they also react adaptively, and they find ways to make pathways for themselves, even in the presence of oppression. And that’s what calls upon their resourcefulness, their resilience, and their adaptability. And from these things, we begin to see how it becomes possible for some people to see that even though people were enslaved, they made great contributions to the growing prosperity of this society.”
Allen encouraged everyone to read the standards: “It’s only those who don’t take the time to read it who will misstate it.”
Elementary, middle school, and high school standards
Here are the standards in the early grades:
- Kindergarten: Recognize African American inventors and explorers
- 1st grade: Identify African American artists
- 2nd grade: Identify African Americans who demonstrated civic service and oral traditions and folktales of African Americans
- 3rd grade: Identify African Americans who demonstrated heroism and patriotism
- 4th grade: Identify African American community leaders who made positive contributions in the state of Florida
- 5th grade: Examine the life of the earliest slaves in North America, the Underground Railroad, and how former slaves partnered with other groups in assisting those escaping from slavery, and key figures in abolitionist movements. Also identify freedoms and rights secured for and by former slaves (including the Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution), the roles of African Americans during westward expansions, and the contributions of African Americans in early Florida.
Here are the middle school standards:
- Identify Afro-Eurasian trade routes and methods prior to the development of the Atlantic slave trade, including differences between serfdom and slavery
- Describe the contact of European explorers with systematic slave trading in Africa
- Examine the evolution of the labor force in the use of indentured servitude contracts, including comparing the treatment of indentured servants of European and African extraction and examining the transition from an indentured to a slave-based economy.
- Describe the history and evolution of slave codes
- Analyze slave revolts in early colonial America
- Examine the service and sacrifice of African patriots during the Revolutionary Era
- Explain early congressional actions regarding the institution of slavery
- Explain the effect of the cotton industry on the expansion of slavery
- Examine the various duties and trades performed by slaves, including how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit
- Examine the Underground Railroad, including the use of “spirituals” and symbols as a form of communication, coordination, coding, and expression
- Identify political figures who strove to abolish the institution of slavery
- Evaluate various abolitionist movements, including Quakers and writings by Africans living in the United States
- Examine how the status of slaves, those who had escaped slavery, and free blacks affected their contributions to the Civil War effort
- Describe significant contributions made by key figures during Reconstruction
Here are the high school standards:
- Examine the condition of slavery as it existed in Africa, Asia, the Americas, and Europe prior to 1619
- Analyze the development of labor systems using indentured servitude contracts with English settlers and Africans early in Jamestown, Virginia, including the shift in attitude toward Africans as Colonial America transitioned from indentured servitude to race-based, hereditary slavery
- Analyze the reciprocal roles of the Triangular Trade routes between Africa and the western hemisphere, Africa and Europe, and Europe and the western hemisphere
- Examine the development of slavery and describe the conditions for Africans during their passage to America
- Explain the significance of England sending convicts, vagabonds, and children to the colonies
- Describe the harsh conditions in the Virginia Colony
- Compare the living conditions of slaves in British North American colonies, the Caribbean, Central America, and South America, including infant mortality rates
- Analyze the headright system in Jamestown and other southern colonies
- Evaluate how conditions for Africans changed in colonial North America from 1619-1776, including the development of slave codes that resulted in an enslaved person becoming property with no rights
- Evaluate efforts by groups to limit the expansion of race-based slavery in Colonial America
- Examine different events in which Africans resisted slavery
- Examine the significance of “Ladinos” and Spanish explorers who laid claim to “La Florida,” including how Spanish-controlled Florida attracted escaping slaves with the promise of freedom
- Describe the contributions of Africans to society, science, poetry, politics, oratory, literature, music, dance, Christianity, and exploration in the U.S. from 1776 to 1865
- Explain how slave codes were strengthened in response to Africans’ resistance to slavery
- Compare the influences of individuals and groups on social and political developments during the Early National Period, including the contributions of key figures
- Examine political actions of the Continental Congress regarding the practice of slavery, including attempts to end or limit slavery
- Examine how federal and state laws shaped the lives and rights for enslaved and free Africans in the 18th and 19th centuries, including gradual abolition laws and the Dred Scott v. Sandford decision
- Analyze the provisions under the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution regarding slavery, including the Three-Fifths Compromise
- Analyze the contributions of founding principles of liberty, justice, and equality in the quest to end slavery
- Examine the range and variety of specialized roles performed by slaves, including trades and the variety of locations where slaves worked
- Explain how early abolitionist movements advocated for the civil rights of Africans in America
- Evaluate the Abolitionist Movement and its leaders and how they contributed in different ways to eliminate slavery
- Describe the impact the Society of Friends (Quakers) had on the abolition of slavery
- Explain how the Underground Railroad and its conductors successfully relocated slaves to free states and Canada
- Explain how the rise of cash crops accelerated the growth of the domestic slave trade in the United States, including the impact of Eli Whitney’s cotton gin and debates over westward expansion of slavery
- Compare the actions of Nat Turner, John Brown, and Frederick Douglass and the direct responses to their efforts to end slavery
- Describe the effects produced by asylum offered to slaves by Spanish Florida, including the significance of Fort Mose as the first free African community in the U.S.
- Describe Florida colonies that existed between the colonial period through the acquisition of Florida
- Analyze the changing social and economic roles of African Americans during the Civil War and the Exodus of 1879
- Examine social contributions of African Americans post-Civil War, including the founding of Historically Black Colleges and Universities and fraternal and sororal organizations
- Examine the importance of sacrifices, contributions, and experiences of African Americans during wartime from the Spanish-American War through the Korean War, including the heroic actions of the Tuskegee Airmen and contributions of African American women in wartime
- Evaluate the relationship of various ethnic groups to African Americans’ access to rights, privileges, and liberties in the U.S., including U.S. Supreme Court cases and the movement for equal rights
- Explain the struggles faced by African American women in the 19th century as it relates to issues of suffrage, business, and access to education
- Describe the emergence, growth, destruction, and rebuilding of black communities during Reconstruction and beyond, including acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans such as the Rosewood Massacre
- Examine economic developments of and for African Americans post-WWI, including the spending power and the development of black businesses and innovations
- Examine political developments of and for African Americans in the post-WWI period, including ramifications of the New Deal on African Americans
- Examine the various factors that led to and the consequences of the Great Migration
- Describe the Harlem Renaissance and examine contributions from African American artists, musicians, and writers and their lasting influence on American culture
- Examine and analyze the impact and achievements of African American women in the fields of education, journalism, science, industry, the arts, and as writers and orators in the 20th century
- Analyze the impact and contributions of African American role models in the 19th and 20th centuries and explain the significance of their work on American society
- Explain how WWII was an impetus for the modern Civil Rights Movement
- Examine key figures and events from Florida that affected African Americans, including the Battle of Olustee
- Analyze the influences and contributions of African American musical pioneers
- Analyze the influence and contributions of African Americans to film
- Examine the importance of sacrifices, contributions, and experiences of African Americans during military service from 1954 to present
- Analyze the course, consequence, and influence of the modern Civil Rights Movement
- Compare differing organizational approaches to achieving equality in America, including the NAACP and Black Panther Party
- Examine organizational approaches to resisting equality in America, including the Ku Klux Klan, poll taxes, literacy laws, sundown laws, and commentary on just and unjust laws
- Explain the struggles and successes for access to equal educational opportunities for African Americans, including Brown v. Board of Education
- Analyze the contributions of African Americans to the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
- Examine the key people who helped shape the modern civil rights movement
- Identify key legislation and individuals who advanced American equality and representative democracy
- Analyze the role of famous African Americans who contributed to the visual and performing arts
- Analyze economic, political, legal, and social experiences of African Americans from 1960 to present
- Examine key events and persons related to society, economics, and politics in Florida as they influenced African American experiences, including the integration of UF
Thank goodness Certain school board members aren’t tasked with teaching the new standards. Seems they, as well as the teachers union, struggle with reading comprehension.
None of these people seem to be doing a very good job of advocating for teachers *or* students.
The middle and high school standards read more like a PhD in AfroAmerican Studies–no time left over for basic math, civics, sciences, language, you know, things that will actually help students make a living and be better citizens in the coming years.
My black neighbor has a sign in her yard that states “it’s all about us”.
This is the selfish slogan for certain people who live as victims!
Citizen, the political slogan “Black Lives Matter” seeks to raise conscientiousness of Americans to consider and empathize equally – not prejudicially – to the suffering and deaths of black Americans. The unequal consideration of these events is evident in the lower sentencing rates for those who have murdered, raped, or otherwise attacked blacks – this is a fact – and until recently at least, the back page coverage of these events, which when compared to white victims, is more likely to be a front page, if not national material. How many of us dismiss crimes as inconsequential depending on the neighborhood where they occur.
So, you have misinterpreted the meaning of the slogan, and the reality which motivates it. Of course white lives matter, but we don’t need reminding of that fact.
Seriously? What “personal benefit” do you think a slave received? It is interesting that the list of people whom the DOE provided as benefiting from slavery skills has already been debunked as either not being slaves or not gaining the skill while enslaved. This standard would be similar to saying that a young lady sold into sex slavery could have gained a skill later used for personal benefit if she was taught how to make a bed and later got a job as a maid. These standards are as abhorrent as the people who voted for them. Sick.
Thank you for a coherent, polite disagreement. It will be a pleasure to discuss differences with you, versus such as jazzman. Out of a long list of items to be included in the curriculum, you chose one item you disagree with. To put that in perspective, in the middle of the last century, in Democrat controlled Chicago, we did not bend over so far as Florida has in finding everything positive we could in Black History. We also did not have the constant racial conflicts that Democrats have caused. The far left organizations here, the local teachers union, FL teachers union, NAACP and even our unusual Vice President all took words totally out of context to express their disapproval of this comprehensive set of standards. Maybe they could use their to provide a curriculum for FL schools, to be compared to the state standards.
Please elaborate on, “We did not have constant racial conflicts that the Democrats have caused.”
“Our unusual Vice President”…? What exactly do you find “unusual” about VP Harris? Don’t bother mincing words, passive aggressiveness doesn’t play well with anybody.
If slave traders showed pictures of southern plantations or northern cities to Muslim-conquered Africans, and gave them a choice, you’d have even more slaves coming over here then. Voluntarily.
Sure. Because being a slave in America would be such an improvement over other slave conditions. But apparently that’s what Florida would like you to believe. That they treated their slaves better than most masters.
This is return to the darkest ages.
Are you trying to kid us? Or yourself? You think they’d have willingly signed away their freedom, given up thinking of themselves as human beings, agreed that some white slave owner could separate them from their parents and children, that they’d have no possessions or income in return for working 365 days a year . . .all so they could live in a shack with a view of a lovely plantation home?
ignorance and proud, eh jeff?
Hey Rich you wouldn’t happen to be state attorney Rich Chang by chance, would you?
Nothing is being watered down. If anything the way we teach slavery is very favorable to AA. We don’t seem to put much, if any, emphasis on the fact that Africans were just as guilty for their role in the slave trade. They did each other in. They kept their own people in cages waiting for the Europeans to come pick them up. And when we informed the Africans that we would no longer be participating in slavery, it was such a lucrative deal for them that quickly tried to sell their own people to other countries instead.
Only weak people unionize. Always a bunch of whining, victimized, over-political idiots.
America has no future. It is washed up and burned out. Despite decades of affirmative action and preferences of every kind for blacks, the nation is still obsessed with its alleged past transgressions. There is no real vision for the future other than more racial hatred, resentment, envy and violence. America is stuck on a glue board like a rat, and it can’t get off. It is totally failing economically with a collapsing infrastructure, racketeering medical system and failed education system. Yet, we fret over the Emancipation Proclamation, unable to move on. How horrible it would be if more people understood the real meaning of the Corwin Amendment and how disHonest Abe Lincoln really felt about slavery. It doesn’t matter now anyway, because the middle class is all but extinct and our government, institutions and individuals are nearly all insolvent. Black, white, red, yellow — it doesn’t matter. We are all living on a reservation now. The slave boats are gone but feudalism has every race in America indebted to the lord of the manor.
Perfect analysis!
The woman pictured appears to be a complete loon. I certainly wouldn’t let her in the same room with children.
Maybe she could tell us, or better yet, provide her version of a curriculum to teach an honest version of Black History.
She’s a whack-job.
It’s always the eyes. They all share the sa.e crazy eyes
Don’t teach math, writing, science or geography, just African American slavery.
No Irish slavery. Nothing about the Indigenous people, just African Slavery.
Jennifer Cabrera, A couple of days ago your moderators declared a polite written comment as spam. Since then, everything is going to moderation. Look at the two comments in this article and tell me how they don’t meet standards. If you agree all of my comments meet standards, please stop withholding them. I don’t rant like some other notable posters.
The “moderators” are software – I have no control over what they do. I have looked at other comment packages, and the only one that’s better collects and sells users’ information. So this is what we have. I approve comments as soon as I can, but I’m the only person managing them.
“Florida students deserve to learn how slaves took advantage of whatever circumstances they were in to benefit themselves and the community of African descendants.” She should have kept this statement. Unhelpful and remarkably poorly worded.
I’m sure they’ll also be adding the history of Native American suffering in the state and territory of Florida. Real soon now. Any minute, in fact.
Left out “Analyze the actions of the Florida government in the 21st century, under Republican control, to disenfranchise black voters through purging voter rolls, making voting more difficult for the poorest citizens while making poll access more limited in time and location, defeating the plain meaning of a constitutional amendment overwhelmingly approved by Florida voters to restore voting rights for felons after completing their sentences, and by fiat of the Governor, eliminating 2 predominantly black congressional districts.”
It’s not clear whether the courses will note the horrific history of Florida political leaders in starting the Civil War, fighting rear-guard actions to stymie Reconstruction, and then end it, and instituting Jim Crow laws which in effect kept some blacks in a state of slavery (blacks arrested for petty crimes – if any – were then lent out to farmers and businesses to “work off” their sentence, while many prominent white men continued to keep black “domestic” women as mistresses, willing or not), and then aided in promoting the “Lost Cause” movement led by the Daughters of the Confederacy and others by placing monuments to the traitors of 1860-1865 on courthouse grounds throughout the state.
While it is more than amusing watching DeSantis get embroiled in defending the idea of the benefits of slavery to blacks, why is the state doing this? This is the new political correctness cooked up by Republicans seeking to rewrite history to comfort their almost all white constituency.
Just say no.
Left out local leadership’s gentrification of certain neighborhoods too.
But the Democrats keep the status quo and continue to tell black people that they need help and can’t live on their own and that in it self is racist. I have seen black Americans move out from the umbrella of democratic party and excel in life. Right now this country is full of race baters that go by the name of Democrat. It in the White House starting with Biden and working through Harris. Even CNN called out Harris for her Gaslighting in Jacksonville over this. Are you really that blind and naive or do you really have to work at being this dumb?
I’ll accept your inability to counter the facts I presented above on the record of state leaders, including the GOP in the 21st century, as agreement. Thanks.
Jazzman, thank you for a non-profane, polite article, even if I disagree with it. You have reversed the political parties responsible for all of the racial tension, past and current. It also is not the Republicans who continue to alter history or science.
If the goal of FEA is to try and bring back AA children to a mindset that took root amongst their ancestors starting in the 1870s; a mindset that was wary of all parties in this system, and a mindset that was big on self-actualization and trying to live in the shadow of the Almighty, then this is a battle worth fighting.
Any goal other than that is just flat out moot.
Schools should show “Gone with the Wind” unedited and discuss history from that. They’d conclude today’s Dem-socialists haven’t changed one bit.
Once again, the Chronicle stands head and shoulders above its legacy media “competition” by providing in depth source material to promote reasoned public discussion. Thanks, Jennifer.
Tony, the Republican Party under Pres Grant took strong measures to enact and enforce Reconstruction which resulted in many black office holders and public education for all, including blacks. By the mid 1870s the north, through the Republican Party, had moved onto other major issues and lost the urgency and dedication which Secession had triggered and so the south, through the Democrats, slowly flipped it and recreated many of the injustices and prejudiced treatment toward blacks, and that lasted with very slow if any improvements up until the CR Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 (now being violated here in Florida and Alabama by minimizing black representation in Congress).
By the way, the major parties of the 19th century bear no resemblance to them now – Lincoln would not be a Republican if alive today, nor would Strom Thurmond be a Democrat ….. wait, I forgot he switched party in the 1990s.
I don’t think any party in the history of mankind has ever resembled the sad state of the current Democrat party in the USA, Jazzman. Did you see Debbie Wasserman Schultz screaming at Robert Kennedy, Jr. for speaking the truth and demanding he be silenced? Someone whose father and uncle died for their countries the way they did should receive more respect and not be subjected to a hideous yapping dog of a woman on the floor of Congress. Payments of $5 million each to both Joe and Hunter have just been unearthed from Burisma. Look at all the obviously insane people in the party; there are too many to try to list. Did Joe have to take a nap in the middle of talking with an Israeli official? I didn’t quite catch all those details.
You must have been hit in the head with a hammer, Jazzman, if you have any doubt that Lincoln might say “Sign me up!” for the Democrat party with its current insane ideology and leadership, not to mention its very recent Klan history. I know your knowledge of America is like a piece of Swiss cheese, but the Midwestern values that Lincoln embodied (including hard work and personal responsibility) are nowhere to be found in the Democrat party. And no, the parties didn’t magically “flip” with respect to racial issues in 1970 or something like that. We have a racist in the WH, not to mention con man, crook, etc.
Gee Mr Peabody, you seem like a reasonable guy not susceptible to partisan propaganda and just interested in an opposing point of view. Of course with a paragon of virtue as your party’s standard bearer, who has never been accused of personally benefitting from being in office, nor his children (see – cough, cough – Ivanka’s trademark deal with China – cough cough (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/28/ivanka-trump-won-china-trademarks-donald-trump-zte-reversal) or Jared’s – cough cough – $2 billion investment from Saudi Arabia – cough-cough (https://www.businessinsider.com/kushners-2-billion-investment-saudi-backed-fund-concealed-sec-rules-2023-2) ) you are in a prime position to highlight your objectivity and high standards in such manners, and I would just love to debate these issues with you.
Nah!
Jazzman. the Republican Party is not one person, although he is popular among some and preferred to such as Biden, Kamala, and Hillary. The difference is that while you and the left focus on Trump, you ignore the the rest of the rabble in the Democrat party and the far left media with wildly slanted and ignored news and how our colleges are ruining what made America great.
PS There is no convincing evidence that Pres Biden took $5 million from anyone.
“The FBI document indicates that the informant provided the information to federal investigators in June 2020, but was describing meetings and conversations dating back to 2015.
The FBI document says an informant described a 2016 meeting where Mykola Zlochevsky, the CEO of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, claimed that he had made two $5 million payments to “the Bidens,” though he didn’t specify who received the alleged bribes.
The informant, whom the FBI has described as highly credible was “not able to provide any further opinion as the veracity” of the claims, according to the FBI document.
At the time of the informant’s meeting with Zlochevsky, Hunter Biden was on Burisma’s board, earning $50,000 a month. But there’s no evidence Joe Biden was involved in his son’s work for the Ukrainian energy company or ever received any payments.
House Democrats previously released a transcript of separate private comments by Zlochevsky made to former Rudy Giuliani ally Lev Parnas that contradict the notion that he ever paid Joe Biden.
According to the transcript, which Parnas provided to Congress in January 2020, Zlochevsky stated that “no one from Burisma had any contacts with VP Biden or people working for him” while Hunter Biden was on the board. Zlochevskey also said Joe Biden and his staff had no involvement in the business dealings of his company….”
https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/20/politics/chuck-grassley-fbi-document/index.html
No proof of Russian collusion either don’t forget.
Jennifer, thanks for another thorough and fact filled report. However, what I think should be crucial and which is not in it your report – and may not be readily available – is who wrote these standards and who approved them. One should expect that academic standards at all levels should be written by experts in the field, and where there might be controversy, experts chosen by a non-partisan or bi-partisan panel, or credentialed academics, Given the excellent University system we have in Florida, that should not be difficult to find.
This should not be another cultural war of the type our Governor is continuously starting, but an earnest and honest program to best teach our kids. We have parents of all parties and races in Florida, but facts are facts, and if we stick to them minus the spin, they will all be best served.
The culture wars were started way before DeSantis came along and they were and are aggressively pushed down from DC and the UN (including the EU). For you to ignore the multinational push to implement such policies worldwide is disingenuous or short sighted. You may be angry at DeSantis for leading a pushback against these policies in your home state but you must remember he was overwhelming voted back for another term due to his stance on social and cultural issues. What is not helpful is the fact that you constantly copy and paste partisan talking points on every issue. Your agenda is transparent. Please go search and find your own thoughts and stop parroting what your puppeteers force down your throat from up high.
My thoughts are my own, and unlike most posters here, I actually have some I am able to communicate clearly. My links are typically to facts, not opinions, though I understand they are inconvenient to most here.
OMG , OMG! So please provide us all the math and facts about how the Gainesville City Commission absolutely destroyed GRU and the City of Gainesville
Finances simultaneously. A Historical Feat no other City and Utility has allowed to happen. Let’s see if you are past the denial stage. No name calling and what ifs allowed.
The ‘facts’ about GRU were posted in great detail by Ed Bielarski during the campaign for Mayor. Unfortunately, they were ignored by a majority of those who voted, as well as you. You can also read them today, as they are available in his book, if you are still unaware.
I like to think I am able to communicate all of my thoughts clearly, Jazzman. Maybe you are on the road to recovery if you have realized that much of what you say sounds jumbled and nonsensical. For example, Ivanka and Jared are not analogous to Joe and Hunter in any way. That’s never going to sound correct regardless of how you try to say it.
Mr, there is no real evidence of Joe receiving any paybacks and the info on Ivanka and China and Jared and Saudi Arabia special deals and paybacks ($2 billion !!) is not in doubt and are known facts.
How does Joe afford to live his billionaire lifestyle? Even you cannot be that obtuse. The money came from somewhere.
There’s not much of anyone who’s non-partisan at UF. Gainesville is clear evidence of that.
Blacks want equal treatment, except when they don’t.
Don’t we all.
The relevant statute requires teaching African American history, including slavery, oppression, etc. The standards above clearly show that the statute is being followed by the State. Everything is working as it should. And yet, our supposed “non-partisan” school board chair doesn’t know any of this. The union rep doesn’t know any of this. And both are pushing a narrative that the mean old Republicans are “whitewashing” and/or distorting history. Is it any wonder that kids are flooding out of the public schools and into charter and private schools?
From the looks of the stated curriculum, it appears to be a pretty diverse choice of subjects.
Maybe that’s what the liberals don’t like about it
The nea is the problem with public schools. It’s only interest is to raise as much money as possible in order to bribe democrats.
Where are my reparations?
You have to line up behind the Chinese and Japanese.
And native Americans. They were here first and have arguably lost more than any other ethnicity. While many black Americans no longer live on plantations, another argument could be made is the greatest population of native Americans is primarily confined to reservations.
Native Americans have moved on. They are not looking to be lazy/entitled and milk their grievances for the next 500 years. I seriously doubt that most are still living on reservations, although there is big money in gambling on reservations which might be a reason to maintain a connection for some.
Shush don’t you see the secret plot? If the slaves learned personal skills, then they should have fended for themselves after 1865. This is laying the groundwork argument for “no reparations” are needed, then or now.
In my 64 years on the planet I have never seen so many bigoted, shallow, irrational minds in one place. Your kids will be sooo proud when they grow up, graduate and realize the history they were taught was really manufactured, whitewashed bias. Why bother teaching them at all?
Wow! And the whitewashing of history is causing more black on black violence.
Evidently White Americans aren’t the only cause of erasing Black American history.
AND YOU WONDER WHY FAMILIES HOMESCHOOL! THIS B*^*H IS SICK
WHERE IS THE TOPIC OF DEMOCRATS ENSLAVING NEGROS FROM THE BEGINNING OF THEIR PARTY? WHERE IS THE TOPIC OF NO REPUBLICIANS HAD SLAVES DURING THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES? WHERE THE TOPIC THAT LESS THAN 20% OF THE POPULATION ARE OF THE NEGRO RACE AND YET ARE 80% OF THE POPULATION INCARCERATED? JUST SAYING
Bet those complaining about the “new standards” will gladly overlook this part of American Slavery so they can continue to blame the white man…. https://www.havefunwithhistory.com/black-slave-owners/
This curriculum looks balanced and reasonable to me. No serious person would deny that slavery was a barbaric, inhumane practice–which is why Western civilization ultimately completely banned the practice, the first to do so to my knowledge in all the thousands upon thousands of years of human slavery all over the world.
There can be no reconciliation without honesty. Just as it would be dishonest to deny that the slave trade happened, it is just as dishonest and I would argue *more* harmful to allow all the various lies and exaggerations about slavery and race relations in America to continue to flourish.
You don’t have to look far on the internet to find people who genuinely believe that colonial-era Europeans invented slavery, invented racism, etc. This is a result of these self-flagellating zealots in the educational system that repeat and amplify any such false claim without even a shred of skepticism or research.
The desire to either not be labelled a racist and/or to be recognized as a victim is so strong with these people that they have completely falsified and distorted this shameful period in our shared American history.
funny if Florida and the US is so bad how come we never see rafts
& planes filled with blacks, asians, hispanics, etc escaping to their utopias of cuba, venezuela, north korea, etc.
‘Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.’-
Prof. G Santayana
you can erase a story, but not the History…