Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday afternoon held a roundtable discussion about masks at schools, but he didn’t invite or include traditional public school educators, even as the new public school year looms and families and educators face decisions on mask-wearing.
In addition to health officials on the roundtable, the participants included two nontraditional charter schools and a rising senior from a Tallahassee private school. Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran was not a panelist.
A Department of Education spokeswoman said she was unaware of the roundtable on Monday afternoon, but would look into it further. That day, the Florida Association of District School Superintendents held a phone conference with Commissioner Corcoran to discuss the coming school year.
The situation became unusual because the media was not allowed to attend the roundtable, despite major concerns across the state about how to approach the next school year, including the mask issue.
The roundtable also was not published on the usual Florida Channel. But it was posted Monday on Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Rumble account. Usually the governor’s Facebook has been used to post videos.
At the roundtable, the governor said that, “At this point, our school districts have proposed ‘mask optional. I think our fear is, is that seeing some of those rumblings, if there’d be an attempt from the federal level or even some of these organizations to try to push for mandatory masking of schoolchildren.”
“So our view is this should absolutely not be imposed, should not be mandated. And I know our Legislature feels strongly about this. Such that, if we started to see push from the feds or some of these local school districts, I know that they’re interested in even a special session to be able to provide protections for parents and kids who want to breathe free.”
more to come….
The post Traditional public school educators left out from DeSantis roundtable on masks at schools first appeared on Daily Florida Press.
from Daily Florida Press https://dailyfloridapress.com/traditional-public-school-educators-left-out-from-desantis-roundtable-on-masks-at-schools/
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