You arrive at school and follow the same routine you’ve performed everyday since the beginning of the year. Give your thanks to the bus driver, greet the principal at the entrance doors, say hello to your friends, and place your backpack into your locker. You make your way into your third grade classroom, excited to start the morning with independent reading time. Your excitement is quickly cut short. The bookshelves, once decorated with an assortment of colorful books, sit barren and lifeless.
For students in Florida schools, this scene has become a reality.
In March 2022, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law HB 1467. The bill, which went into effect in July of last year, aims to increase transparency about the material used in classroom instruction and to give families a voice in the content taught to their children.
The bill reads that “Any material used in a classroom, made available in a school library, or included on a reading list [that] contains content that is pornographic or prohibited under [state statute], is not suited to student needs and their ability to comprehend the material presented, or is inappropriate for the grade level and age group for which the material is used” shall not be approved.
While it is important for families to be involved in their child’s education, this bill will do more harm than good for our students. We’ve already seen this on a surface level: Florida teachers are either covering their classroom libraries or removing books entirely, taking away students’ access to reading books. Teachers who knowingly give students books that haven’t been cleared run the risk of being charged with a third-degree felony. Only books that have been approved by a librarian or media specialist can be used in classrooms.
However, the harm this bill will cause goes much deeper.
Florida’s education system has been in the news recently for banning the teaching of critical race theory in schools and passing laws that have LGBTQIA+ students feeling ostracized. In late January of this year, DeSantis rejected the teaching of the Advanced Placement (AP) course on African American studies. Now, fears that HB 1467 will remove stories that don’t follow white, heterosexual, and/or cisgender narratives plagues the hearts of students, families, and teachers everywhere.
This censorship hides the truth of the United States’ history. Its past can be an uncomfortable subject to discuss, but not every topic taught in school will be, or should be, comfortable. It’s a lie and a disservice to our students to pretend the United States has a conflict-free past that has always been equal for all.
Additionally, students who don’t fit a certain narrative will continue to lose their already lacking representation. The United States is often referred to as a melting pot; a range of cultures, backgrounds, identities, and traditions that make up the diverse country. While this description is true, we don’t see that same diversity reflected in our children’s literature. In an infographic from the Cooperative Children’s Book Center of University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Education titled “Diversity in Children’s Books 2018,” 50% of the children’s books compiled depicted white characters. The second highest representation? Animals. At 27%, “Animals/Other” accounted for more characters than all Black, Asian, Latinx, and Native American characters combined. Now, racial and ethnic representation is at even greater risk due to HB 1467. Not only will students be left feeling as though their identity is something that should not be talked about, but they will also lose opportunities to understand and appreciate the diversity of the United States and other nations.
During my research for this article, I came across a quote I feel directly correlates with the issues surrounding Florida’s education system. Activist Jasmine Cho shared during a TEDx Talk, “Privilege is when your history is taught as core curriculum, while mine is taught as an elective.” For the students who will lose representation through this new approval process, this quote will have a greater impact than it likely ever did before.