Florida Department of Education Approves Anti-LGBTQ Rules
Rules align with several new laws aimed at restricting LGBTQ visibility and enforcing gender-conforming behaviors among students.
The Florida Board of Education has adopted five new rules targeting the LGBTQ community under the guise of enhancing parental rights and protecting students from alleged “indoctrination.”
Among the rules adopted earlier this week are a rule that threatens students with discipline for using restrooms that do not match their assigned sex at birth, and a complementary rule that would yank teachers’ or faculty members’ credentials for using a restroom that does not match their assigned sex at birth.
Another rule requires schools to obtain parental consent to refer to students by any names that differ from a student’s given name. A third, governing “professional conduct,” expressly prohibits teachers from providing instruction related to LGBTQ topics to all students, except in high school-level health or science classes — and only if parents are allowed the chance to “opt out” beforehand.
That same rule also prohibits teachers from telling students their preferred pronouns or ask students about their own preferred pronouns. Punishment for breaking those rules could result in the suspension or revocation of a teacher’s certification.
Another rule dictates that parents give their permission before their children participate in any extracurricular activities — a rule that critics say aims to prevent LGBTQ students from participating in or joining any organizations like a Gender and Sexuality Alliance or Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA). Yet another rule on school-sponsored events or activities prohibits teachers from taking students to “adult live performances” or allowing such a performance to occur on school grounds — a measure that is designed to prevent schools from hostig drag shows or Drag Queen Story Hour-type events.
“What we’re doing is what we’re require to do [which] is implementing the laws that the legislature passed and the governor signed,” Board Chair Ben Gibson said as the meeting ended. “Although it was long, we did a lot of great work today. We protected parents’ rights, we empowered teachers, and, most importantly, I think we restored a lot common sense back in our schools.”
Each of the new rules — including additional ones that limit the teaching of Black history in schools and downplay the role of racism or racially-motivated attacks within history — was crafted to align with 18 new laws signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis back in May, including one of the more consequential anti-LGBTQ measures, the expansion of the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.
According to Tampa-based FOX affiliate KSTU, Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. did not attend most of the meeting but issued a press release praising the board’s for ensuring its rules comply with the newly passed laws.
“There is no higher calling than to protect our children from unwelcome influences and indoctrination,” Diaz said. “The rules adopted today ensure that our kids can be kids while in the care of our schools. I thank Governor Ron DeSantis, the Legislature and the State Board of Education for their unwavering commitment to the health, wellbeing and safety of our students.”
But critics said the rules — and the laws they are based upon — are an attack against members of the LGBTQ community.
“These policies and laws are chipping away at that safe feeling and putting my children at risk,” one parent commented during the meeting. “Teachers are leaving their profession in this state since the passage of these restrictive laws. My daughter was a fourth-grade teacher, but she chose to leave because she refused to hide her identity.”
Will Larkins, an LGBTQ rights activist and alumnus of Winter Park High School who helped run the GSA at the school, testified that the policy requiring parental permission for extracurricular activities will effectively “out” LGBTQ students and potentially deny those with unsupportive parents a rare “safe space.”
“We had several students who were living homeless at 16, 17 years old because their parents kicked them out of their house for being gay, for being trans,” Larkins said, according to Florida Today. “Their parents are not going to sign that permission slip, but these students only found solace in this community, this after-school activity.”
The LGBTQ rights group Equality Florida blasted the new rules as detrimental to LGBTQ students’ wellbeing.
“This politically motivated war on parents, students, and educators needs to stop. Our students deserve classrooms where all families are treated with the respect they deserve and all young people are welcomed,” Jennifer Solomon, the group’s parents and families support manager. “Instead, the DeSantis Administration continues to wield the state against us, insisting that politicians know better than we do how best to educate our children. Let parents be parents. Let educators be educators. And stop turning our kids’ classrooms into political battlefields to score cheap points.”
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