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Public School Chaplains, Other Education Laws Take Effect Monday in Florida

Jay Waagmeester — Tue, 02 Jul 2024 18:30:00 +0000

This article was originally published in

The 2024 legislative session saw approval of divisive education-related laws, several of which take effect Monday. Read our partial run-down on what will change in Sunshine State schools in the new fiscal year:

HB 931: Volunteer school chaplains

in other GOP-controlled states, a Florida law implementing volunteer chaplains in schools will take effect Monday.

The law has generated concern regarding the qualifications required of chaplains and separation of church and state.

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Volunteer chaplains must pass a background check — the law specifies no other qualifications. Applicants must submit their name and religious affiliation to the school for public disclosure.

Members of the they would participate in the program, the prospect of which stalled the program in some states but not Florida.

Gov. Ron DeSantis said during , “You don’t have to worry” about satanists participating in the chaplain program because “that is not a religion. That is not qualified to be able to participate in this.”

The group claims to be recognized by the IRS as a church.

The bill faced pushback on ground of religious indoctrination from the ACLU, Interfaith Alliance, and National Education Association.

HB 1291: Prohibits identity politics in teacher prep programs

Teacher preparation programs in Florida, effective Monday, may not include instruction on “theories that systemic racism, sexism, oppression, and privilege are inherent in the institutions of the United States and were created to maintain social, political, and economic inequities.”

A sponsor of the bill, Rep. Berny Jacques, a Republican from Pinellas County, allows the government to “take out the trash once and for all,” arguing that diversity, equity, and inclusion; critical race theory; and “all of that stuff is simply trash.”

DeSantis said of teacher preparation programs, “There’s not going to be any of the bogus history. It’s just going to be standard teacher preparation without having an ideological agenda.”

Florida Education Association President Andrew Spar said the bill takes “valuable tools away from educators” and will deprive students of critical life skills.

HB 49: Lessening child labor restrictions

Minors aged 16 and 17 will be allowed to work more than six consecutive days in a week, effective Monday.

The new law allows them to work more than 8 hours on holidays and weekends, and allows parents or a school superintendent to permit them to work more than 30 hours per week when school is in session.

The work restrictions do not apply to those who are home schooled or attend virtual school.

into law in March, notifying the public via a news release announcing 25 total bill signings.

HB 1403: Expansion of school choice programs

Monday marks an increased number of school choice scholarships available to Florida families.

The law increases Family Empowerment Unique Ability voucher availability to 72,615 students with unique abilities – an increase of approximately 32,000 students.

Deadlines for payments by scholarship funding organizations and the Department of Education to voucher recipients are codified under this law, which allows no more than a week for tuition and fee payments to be rendered after their approval.

The law combines Hope Scholarship vouchers and Florida Tax Credit vouchers and expands scholarship programs to dependent children of active-duty military members who have permanent change-of-station orders to Florida.

Additionally, scholarship funding organizations are required to submit an annual list of items by Aug. 1 this year and each July 1 in the years following that are prohibited to be purchased with vouchers. In the most recent year, tickets to amusement parks, TVs, paddle boards, and more were eligible for purchase for families who home-schooled children.

The measure passed the Senate unanimously and had bipartisan support in the House.

HB 1473: School safety

Schools have until Aug. 1 to comply with a law that takes effect Monday mandating that all entry points and classroom doors in public schools must be locked when students are on campus, unless guarded by a staff member.

Failure to comply would subject staff members to discipline including mandatory training in safety requirements.

The law replaces a 12-hour diversity-training requirement with training in de-escalating incidents.

The measure passed both chambers with unanimous support.

SB 1264: History of communism

With Democrats divided, to expand instruction in the history of communism.

The law creates an Institute for Freedom in the Americas at Miami-Dade College to “preserve the ideals of a free society and promote democracy in the Americas” and renames the Adam Smith Center for the Study of Economic Freedom at Florida International University to the Adam Smith Center for Economic Freedom.

The law requires that students, starting in 2026, be taught about communism as soon as kindergarten. Previously, communism curricula did not begin until seventh grade in Florida public schools.

DeSantis said while that the number of “leftist governments” in the Western Hemisphere is higher today than during the Cold War. He blamed “apologists for communism in our society” for the necessity of the law.

The Florida Department of Education is responsible for crafting the curricula, which must include the “atrocities committed in foreign countries under the guidance of communism.” The law states that the department may seek input from “victims of communism or any state or nationally recognized organization dedicated to the victims of communism.”

Other laws going into effect Monday

: by nonparents to one book per month under the to object to books available in school libraries and classrooms.

: In addition to expanded employment outreach for veterans, middle schools and high schools to hold 45-minutes of instructional time about Veterans Day and Memorial Day near those holidays.

: A law authorizing trained staff to use short-acting bronchodilators and schools to buy inhaler devices.

: Enables districts to publish notices regarding intentions to adopt budgets meeting schedules on school board websites instead of in newspapers and increases teacher recruitment efforts.

: A law to re-engage students who have dropped out of high school by providing them with career education courses; waives tuition within the Florida College System for dropouts who take these courses.

Vetoes

Two of the 13 bills DeSantis has vetoed so far have been education related:

: Would have provided in-state tuition for those serving time in state or federal prisons but was vetoed by the governor on Tuesday. the veto, saying, “We should not reward criminal activity by providing inmates with the same benefits as law-abiding citizens.”

: Would have waived the Graduate Record Examination and the Graduate Management Admission Test for people who have served in the military and who seek acceptance into graduate programs. the tests are necessary but that the motivation for the legislation was laudable. “It is not clear that waiving these tests will be beneficial to our institutions or even, in many cases, to the students themselves.”

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com. Follow Florida Phoenix on and .

Florida Considers Chaplains in Schools While Other Red States Reject the Move

Jackie Llanos — Sat, 08 Jun 2024 12:01:00 +0000

This article was originally published in

Come July 1, school districts in Florida could authorize volunteer chaplains — those who are religious or not and with no training — to provide support and services for students in public schools, though GOP-controlled legislatures across the country are rejecting similar proposals.

Last year, passed a first-of-its-kind law authorizing schools to pay for religious figures to work in mental health roles, and lawmakers in 15 states followed suit by pitching similar legislation.

Since then, Florida is the only state where the legislature passed the measure and Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the bill (), though Louisiana, Oklahoma and Ohio could still pass their versions this year.

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The proposals from lawmakers to bring chaplains into public schools have varied, with states taking different paths regarding the requirements for people to serve as school chaplains and their purpose.

The school chaplain measures have fallen short this year in Alabama, Nebraska, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, Utah, Missouri and Pennsylvania, according to a Florida Phoenix analysis of the chaplain bills.

Florida’s Legislature is controlled by Republicans, but some Democrats supported the move. So beginning July 1, public school districts can decide whether they’ll adopt a volunteer chaplain program, and parents must provide written consent before their children participate. But there is nothing in the legislation that requires the chaplains to have any specific degrees. Those requirements are up to the school districts.

Jackie Llanos/Florida Phoenix

There’s already controversy

HB 931 is already stirring controversy between DeSantis and the Satanic Temple. When in April, he said Satanists would not be eligible to become chaplains. His comments came after representatives of the , which claims IRS recognition as a church, expressed the group’s intention to sign up members to become volunteer chaplains.

The Florida bill doesn’t state what religion the chaplains must practice. In fact, the volunteer chaplains don’t even have to have a religious affiliation. However, the language in the bill states that “any school district or charter school that adopts a volunteer school chaplains policy must publish the list of volunteer school chaplains, including any religious affiliation, on the school district or charter school’s website.”

How big of a splash HB 931 will make in Florida public schools is up in the air as school districts don’t have to hold a public vote on the issue, whereas Texas required its school districts to do so.

Still, Holly Hollman, general counsel to the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, says Florida’s school leaders could also look to their Texas counterparts for how they handled the question. As of April, only one in Texas had hired chaplains, according to The Texas Tribune, a partner of the States Newsroom.

“As a growing number of chaplains speak out, school districts will see that these proposals are not simple support for students but, in fact, are deeply problematic,” Hollman said in a phone interview with Florida Phoenix. “The main thing is that school districts will be thinking about what they need and how to support students, and as they look more closely, they will see that this is clearly outside of the mandate for public schools.”

Utah says no to Satanists

The threat of members of the Satanic Temple acting as chaplains in public schools was enough for to turn down the proposal this year. On the final day of the GOP-controlled Utah legislative session, the state’s chaplain bill failed in a narrow 16-12 vote.

During Senate floor debate, multiple GOP lawmakers who voted against the bill said it would leave the door too wide open for people to serve as chaplains, and Salt Lake County Republican Lincoln Fillmore said the body would regret approving the bill after seeing the results.

“In the current culture that exists in public schools, bringing chaplains would be more likely to make it worse than better because we wouldn’t be able to discriminate, and so any religion that wanted to be able to place a chaplain there would be able to do so,” Fillmore said in a phone interview with the Phoenix. “So as you guys are seeing in Florida, that includes the church of satan who wants to place chaplains there. We had chaplains who testify for the bill in ours and the satanic church was all in favor of it.”

Fillmore’s advice to Florida as the law goes into effect: Be careful.

“I know there’s a worry on the right. It’s a founded worry,” he said. “It’s based on experience and the actual events that schools are trying to broaden and teach and influence things beyond math, and science and history. So be very conscious about what chaplains are actually doing in schools.”

Indiana declines to employ chaplains as counselors

Even though Texas’ school chaplain law stated that they would be hired in mental health roles, the lawmakers who pitched proposals in other states were not as overt in that intention, including in Florida. During committee hearing testimony and floor debates on the bill, Republican Sen. Erin Grall, a sponsor of the bill, said a volunteer chaplain program could be viewed as an alternative to school counselors for some families.

But in Indiana, Republican Sen. Stacey Donato leaned into the idea of chaplains serving as counselors. Her would have allowed public schools to hire chaplains to provide secular guidance to students and school employees. Among the requirements, chaplains had to have a master’s degree in a field related to religion and two years of counseling experience.

Despite the GOP controlling both chambers of the Indiana General Assembly, Donato’s effort wasn’t successful this year. Lawmakers the language allowing chaplains to work as counselors from another proposal requiring schools to grant parents’ requests for their students to leave classes to attend religious instruction, according to States Newsroom’s Indiana Capital Chronicle.

Alabama Democrats take the lead

Most Democrats across state legislatures have opposed the school chaplain bills, claiming that it would insert religion into public schools and allow unlicensed people to deal with students’ mental health problems.

Still, Rodger Smitherman, a Democrat from Birmingham, Alabama, insisted his plan to bring chaplains to public schools wasn’t an effort to replace counselors. While the legislation didn’t face any opposition in the Senate, Smitherman was on board with a on May 1 that heavily altered his bill, according to States Newsroom’s Alabama Reflector.

Originally, Smitherman’s proposal allowed schools to hire or accept chaplains as volunteers to provide support and services if they passed a background check and completed a recognized chaplain training program. Following the amendment, chaplains can only serve as volunteers to support teachers at their request, and school boards no longer have to take a vote on whether they will enact the program.

“We’re doing this work for our teachers’ safety,” Democratic Rep. TaShina Morris said during the committee hearing. “And if they need to have someone to talk to, we should allow them that access.”

However, the legislature didn’t vote on the bill by the time Sine Die came on Thursday night.

Oklahoma’s resurrected bill

After four school chaplain bills didn’t even get a hearing in the Oklahoma Legislature, a Republican lawmaker decided to resurrect a from 2023 to further the effort to bring chaplains into public schools in that state, according to States Newsroom’s Oklahoma Voice.

Moore County Rep. Kevin West’s maneuver cleared the House in a 54-37 vote, with 20 Republicans voting against it. The Senate has not voted on the bill yet, but amendments in the House for volunteer or employed school chaplains, according to Oklahoma Voice.

The bill states that school chaplains can’t attempt to convert anyone to their religion and must get an endorsement from their faith group. Additionally, they must hold a bachelor’s and graduate degree in theology or religious studies.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Diane Rado for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com. Follow Florida Phoenix on and .

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