Tag: public schools

DeSantis Administration Announces Statewide Investigation into Educators Celebrating Charlie Kirk’s Murder: “Govern Yourselves Accordingly”

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’s administration announced a statewide investigation into educators celebrating Charlie Kirk’s political assassination.

Florida Commissioner of Education Anastasios Kamoutsas sent a letter to superintendents throughout the state warning that the DeSantis administration will not tolerate such vile behavior.

The letter reads:

TO: School District Superintendents
FROM: Anastasios Kamoutsas
DATE: September 11, 2025
SUBJECT: Upholding Professional Conduct and Ethical Responsibilities

It has been brought to my attention that some Florida educators have posted despicable comments on social media regarding the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk. These few are not a reflection of the great, high-quality teachers who make up the vast majority of Florida’s educators. Nevertheless, I will be conducting an investigation of every educator who engages in this vile, sanctionable behavior.

This memorandum serves to remind superintendents and their employees that they are held to a higher standard as public servants. Certified educators are also subject to the ethical guidelines established in Rule 6A-10.081, Florida Administrative Code (F.A.C.), Principles of Professional Conduct for the Education Profession in Florida. In addition, pursuant to section (s.) 1012.796, Florida Statutes (F.S.), the Commissioner may find probable cause to sanction an educator’s certificate. Furthermore, s. 1012.795,
F.S., authorizes the Education Practices Commission to discipline an educator for violation of Rule 6A-
10.081, F.A.C.

Although educators have First Amendment rights, these rights do not extend without limit into their professional duties. An educator’s personal views that are made public may undermine the trust of the students and families that they serve. If an educator’s conduct causes a student or his or her family to feel unwelcome or unwilling to participate in the learning environment, it may be a violation of Rule 6A-10.081, F.A.C. Florida law allows the Commissioner to find probable cause to discipline an educator
who, “upon investigation, has been found guilty of personal conduct that seriously reduces that person’s effectiveness as an employee of the district school board.”

I expect you to share this reminder with all school district employees. Together, we must uphold the highest standards of professionalism and keep Florida’s classrooms places of safety and academic achievement for every student.

Govern yourselves accordingly.

Teachers are held to a higher standard as public servants and must ensure their conduct does not undermine the trust of the students and families they serve. We will hold teachers who choose to make disgusting comments about the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk accountable.… pic.twitter.com/KzXCCGkvZm

— Anastasios Kamoutsas (@StasiKamoutsas) September 11, 2025

Governor DeSantis added, “Celebrating the assassination of a 31-year-old father of two young kids is disturbing. That teachers would be among those who do so is completely unacceptable.”

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Texas attorney general wants students to pray in school – unless they’re Muslim

Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general running for US Senate, has long believed in school prayer. Now, he’s prescribing precisely what type of prayer he wants the state’s 6 million public school students to recite.

“In Texas classrooms, we want the Word of God opened, the Ten Commandments displayed, and prayers lifted up,” Paxton said in a statement on Tuesday, encouraging students to say “the Lord’s Prayer, as taught by Jesus Christ”.

The press release included the full text of the Lord’s Prayer as it is written in the King James version of the Bible, the latest example of Paxton and other Texas officials seeming to endorse Christianity over other faiths.

“Twisted, radical liberals want to erase Truth, dismantle the solid foundation that America’s success and strength were built upon, and erode the moral fabric of our society,” Paxton said. “Our nation was founded on the rock of Biblical Truth, and I will not stand by while the far-left attempts to push our country into the sinking sand.”

Paxton’s statement was released as Senate Bill 11 went into effect across Texas; it’s a piece of Republican legislation allowing schools to set aside time for “prayer and reading of the Bible or other religious texts” during the school day. Critics have condemned the bill as an attempt to imbue a secular public education in the state with the practice of Christianity, in violation of the US constitution’s separation of church and state.

“They’re blowing right through separation of church and state,” said Heidi Beirich, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism.

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Massachusetts School District Under Investigation for Forcing Kids to Take Graphic Sex and Gender Surveys, Ignoring Opt-Out Requests in Violation of Parental Rights

The Department of Education has launched a formal investigation into Burlington Public Schools in Massachusetts, following parents’ accusations that the district ignored their opt-out requests and forced students to participate in the 2025 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS).

The probe, initiated by the Department’s Student Privacy Policy Office (SPPO), is investigating potential violations of the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment (PPRA). This federal law guarantees parents the right to exempt their children from surveys that ask for sensitive, private information.

The YRBS, administered to students at Marshall Simonds Middle School and Burlington High School in March, included explicit questions on topics like drug and alcohol use, mental health, sexual encounters, sexual orientation, and “gender identity.”

Parents were notified in advance about their opt-out rights, and several submitted written requests to exclude their children from the survey. Despite this, the district allegedly required the opted-out students to take it anyway, with at least one teacher reportedly forcing a student to participate over clear objections.

Screenshots of the survey questions, provided in a complaint filed by the Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) and parents, reveal the invasive nature of the content.

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Trump Says Youth Vaccine Mandate Rollback is a “Very Tough Position” – “They Just Pure and Simple Work… I Think Those Vaccines Should be Used”

President Trump on Friday expressed support for mandatory vaccines for school-aged children, amid Health and Human Services Secretary RFK Jr.’s push to end unnecessary vaccination. 

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. testified Thursday before the Senate Finance Committee, where Democrats sought to grill him about his personnel and vaccine guidance shake-up at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Per the Hill, “the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stopped recommending the COVID-19 vaccine for those under 18. Kennedy, meanwhile, has fired all 17 sitting members of CDC’s vaccine advisory panel and also moved to oust the CDC head and other top HHS experts.”

During the Senate hearing, RFK revealed that in the early 2000s, a senior CDC scientist was ordered to destroy data from an internal study that showed a staggering link between the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine and autism risk in young Black boys. The data showed that black boys, who got vaccinated before 24 months of age or 36 months of age, “had a 260% greater chance of getting an autism diagnosis than children who waited,” RFK said.

This also comes after Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced earlier this week that the Florida Department of Health is planning to remove “every last” vaccine mandate from Florida law.

“All of them. Every last one of them,” Ladapo said to loud cheers and a standing ovation.

“Who am I, as the government, or anyone else, who am I as a man standing here now to tell you what you should put in your body? Who am I to tell you what your child should put in their body? I don’t have that right.”

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The Statistics War Over School Shootings Since Columbine, Especially By Transgender Shooters

Since the horrific Columbine shooting in April 1999, there’ve been a tragic number of American public and religious school shootings. No matter how “experts” gloss over their statistics, if a single death is a tragedy, mass killings are light years beyond “tragedy.”

Having lost a son in high school – not from shooting, but from another life-altering catastrophe – I can only imagine the tidal wave of grief engulfing the family and friends of those lost children.

Much less reported, though nonetheless a tragedy, is that a disproportionate number of these shootings were perpetrated by those who identify as “transgender.” 

Triggered by this latest shooting, I went looking for the real stats, trying to discover how much tragedy is really out there. I sought what most media shy away from. 

As a trained journalist, I dug deep, recalling that:

If you want to know how many school shootings have occurred, just check the stats. 

I’d learned this in J-School: Numbers never lie. Of course, my pre-Watergate profs assumed credible sources had credible numbers.    

Right? Well, maybe. But don’t count on it.

While citing traditionally credible sources, the one that seems most honest in pointing out that nobody knows which stats to refer to as they judge the horrific impact of school shootings, Al Jazeera – a source I never thought I’d cite – said it clearly on August 28, 2025. 

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Teachers Unions Fund Leftist Causes While Students Fail Math, Reading

As union-controlled public schools in big cities continue failing to educate kids, a new report shows that the nation’s two largest teachers’ unions have contributed almost $50 million to far-left interest groups since 2022.

When kids headed back to school nationwide last week, the Defending Education website reported that the National Education Association (NEA) and American Teachers Federation (AFT) is more interested in promoting crazy causes than educating kids.

Meanwhile, during the same time, multiple reports showed that urban students are not proficient in basic subjects such as math and reading.

As urban kids languish in schools with barely literate teachers, AFT and NEA poured money into a who’s who of leftist kookery.

In the past three years, the two anti-Christian, anti-American unions “have given out a combined $43,524,123 in funding to leftwing and far-left groups,” Defending Education reported.

Some organizations receiving funds include MoveOn.org, PEN America, the Sixteen Thirty Fund, the Trevor Project, and a handful of state and federal leftwing Political Action Committees (PACs). For example, the two unions gave a combined $9,300,000 to For Our Future Action Fund, a leftwing political action committee. Additionally, the NEA gave the State Engagement Fund $9,500,000 over the same period.

AFT contributed $14,747,625 to organized leftism, while the NEA pumped in almost twice that much with $28,776,500.

AFT shoveled $100,000 each into the Color of Change PAC; National Action Network; the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation; and $200,000 into the Center for American Progress.

The Democratic Governors Association collected $600,000.

NEA delivered $106,146 to the Alliance for Justice; $500,000 to the Center for American Progress; and $75,000 to the Tides Center, a “progressive incubator” tightly linked to left-wing billionaire George Soros.

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Ken Paxton Calls For Putting Prayer And Bible Back In Texas Schools

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton urged schools to prepare for classroom prayer and Bible reading following the passage of a new state law.

“In Texas classrooms, we want the Word of God opened, the Ten Commandments displayed, and prayers lifted up,” Paxton said in a statement.

He recommended that students start with the Lord’s Prayer from Matthew 6:9-13.

He warned that the far left is actively working to strip schools of America’s spiritual foundation.

“Twisted, radical liberals want to erase Truth, dismantle the solid foundation that America’s success and strength were built upon, and erode the moral fabric of our society,” he said. “Our nation was founded on the rock of Biblical Truth, and I will not stand by while the far left attempts to push our country into the sinking sand.”

The announcement follows Senate Bill 11, approved during the 89th Legislature. The law requires school boards to vote within six months of Sept. 1, 2025, on whether to adopt policies permitting voluntary prayer and Bible reading.

The measure also directs the Attorney General’s Office to defend districts or charter schools that adopt such policies.

Supporters quickly praised the move.

“God bless you, General Paxton, for having the courage to begin the legal process of putting prayer and reading of Scripture in Texas classrooms,” Melissa Katz wrote on X.

“Amen! Thank you, sir!” added Alexander Duncan, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Critics online pushed back.

“His actions are unconstitutional. I attend mass every week. Public school should be for all, not just Christians. Note, I am a Christian/Catholic and still feel this way,” wrote Vincomputerman.

“So now students have to take time out from academics so that there can be a prayer hour? Since when can’t people pray on their own time?” asked X user Johnson@F1979J.

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DeSantis and Ladapo aim to make Florida first in US to end all vaccine mandates

Florida is set to push for an end to all state vaccine mandates, state Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo announced at a news conference Wednesday.

For decades, the state has required numerous vaccines for kids attending school, a list that today includes shots that protect against measles-mumps-rubella, polio, chickenpox and hepatitis B.

But Ladapo on Wednesday compared these mandates to “slavery,” and promised that they all will soon end.

“All of them. Every last one of them,” Ladapo said to raucous cheers from the crowd assembled at the Grace Christian School in Valrico. “Who am I as a man standing here now to tell you what you should put in your body?”

Dr. Nancy Silva, a Wesley Chapel pediatrician, said ending the vaccine mandates for schoolchildren will endanger their health and bring back diseases with life-threatening health complications that most parents of school-age children have never faced.

She questioned why the DeSantis administration would make vaccines an issue when school mandates have proven effective at eradicating and minimizing the spread of childhood diseases.

“I hope parents understand the great wonder of vaccines and how they have saved millions of lives over the decades.”

Immunizations have saved at least 154 million lives in the last 50 years, according to the World Health Organization. The vast majority of the lives saved were infants.

All 50 states and Washington, D.C., have laws requiring certain vaccines for students to attend school. Florida is the first state to publicly call for doing away with such requirements.

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Ohio School Offical Appears to Coach Parents on Circumventing State Laws to Put Male Trans Student on Girls Team

Accuracy in Media has released a disturbing video that appears to show an Ohio school official coaching parents on how to circumvent laws keeping girls safe by keeping boys out of girls’ sports and spaces.

In 2023, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine vetoed House Bill 68, which sought to prohibit gender-affirming care for minors and to restrict transgender athletes’ participation in girls’ and women’s sports.

Last year, the State Senate voted to override DeWine’s veto.

But that didn’t stop an Ohio school official from brainstorming ways to bypass the law.

The video, shared by Accuracy in Media, shows undercover investigators, posing as prospective parents of a trans student, meeting with Princeton City Schools Assistant Athletic Director Tamette Duckworth.

The video shows Duckworth strategizing with investigators to help the alleged transgender student join the girls’ teams and access female facilities.

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She Couldn’t Read Her Own Diploma: Why Public Schools Pass Students but Fail Society

A nineteen-year-old college student is suing her former high school for negligence because she graduated despite being unable to read or write.

The student, Aleysha Ortiz, graduated from Hartford Public Schools in the spring of 2024 with honors.

She earned a scholarship to attend the University of Connecticut, where she’s studying public policy. But while she was in high school, she had to use speech-to-text apps to help her read and write essays, and despite years of advocating for support for her literacy struggles, her school never addressed them.

Her story is shocking, but unfortunately, it isn’t isolated. At 24 Illinois public schools, not a single student can read at grade level. Nationwide, 54 percent of the American adult population reads at or below a sixth grade level. Put a different way: only 46 percent of American adults gained even a middle-school level mastery of literacy—let alone high school or collegiate levels.

In a first-world country where we spend nearly $16,000 per student per year to educate our children, that’s a horrifying statistic.

Literacy is supposed to be the bedrock of a free and liberally educated society. As the Washington Post’s motto so aptly reminds us, “democracy dies in darkness.”

Illiteracy is a form of darkness, and an illiterate populace is not one equipped to handle the demands of a world filled with forms and papers and words, let alone be the voting citizens of a democratic society.

What Do Literacy Stats Actually Mean?

Officially, the United States reports a basic literacy rate of 99 percent (which should perhaps be called into question, if students like Aleysha Ortiz can graduate with honors and still be illiterate).

But “basic literacy” is a bit of a sales pitch. It sounds impressive, but in practice, “basic literacy skills” means a K-3 grade level of reading—things like Hop on Pop and Amelia Bedelia.

“Functional literacy” is what actually matters: the ability to read and understand things like forms, instructions, job applications, and other forms of text you’ll encounter in your day-to-day life. It measures both technical reading skill and comprehension—your ability to decipher the words, and your ability to discern their meaning.

An estimated 21 percent of American adults (~43 million Americans) are functionally illiterate, meaning they have difficulty reading and comprehending instructions and filling out forms. A functionally illiterate American adult is unable to complete tasks like reading job descriptions or filling out paperwork for Social Security and Medicaid.

Perhaps worse still is the statistic that 54 percent of the American adult population reads at or below a sixth-grade level. Most of us don’t think about reading in terms of grade level, so this statistic feels intuitively bad but practically meaningless. What is a sixth-grade level?

Books written at the sixth-grade level are intended (in both literacy and comprehension skills) for eleven- and twelve-year-olds. Think of books like A Wrinkle in Time, Percy Jackson and The Olympians, and The Giver.

They’re good stories, but they don’t require the same vocabulary and mental acuity as making sense of a tax form. This is an excerpt from The Giver:

Garbriel’s breathing was even and deep. Jonas liked having him there, though he felt guilty about the secret. Each night he gave memories to Gabriel: memories of boat rides and picnics in the sun; memories of soft rainfall against windowpanes; memories of dancing barefoot on a damp lawn.

More complex than Dick and Jane or Hop on Pop, obviously. But this isn’t an adult level of comprehension. If your reading abilities cap out here, you’re going to encounter a lot of text in your day-to-day life that’s difficult to decipher—often things that are important for you to be able to comprehend, like the terms of a lease agreement or the instructions on a medication.

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