Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has quietly moved away from much of his anti-woke crusade, swayed by tanking poll results that suggest his campaign to become president is in big trouble.
But a columnist wrote Wednesday his policy shift has not altered his conservative attack on his state’s education system – and it’s created a severe “brain drain.”
“DeSantis has enacted multiple 'educational gag orders' that criminalize classroom discussions of race, gender identity, and ugly historical realities that might make white students 'feel guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress,'" wrote Kali Holloway in The Nation.
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She went on, “The end result is an exodus of teachers, and what Florida Education Association (FEA) head Andrew Spar has called “one of the worst teacher and staff shortages” in the state’s history."
Spar said teachers across the state have told him they want out of the career, beaten by encroaching right-wing politics and threats of legal action if they inadvertently teach the wrong thing – coupled with low pay.
Halloway reported that, in January 2019, when DeSantis was sworn in as governor, the state had 2,217 teacher vacancies in K-12 public schools.
In January 2023 it had 5,294 and, in August this year, 7,000.
The exodus from public schools is reflected in higher education. His takeover of the state university New College, filling its board of trustees with his allies, drove 40 percent of faculty to quit.
DeSantis has shrugged off any suggestions of an impending educational brain drain,” wrote Holloway.
Of the New College faculty departures, he said, “If you’re a professor in, like, you know, Marxist studies, that’s not a loss for Florida.”