Racism, gender identity and banned books. Escambia School Board entangled in crossfire.

While Gov. Ron DeSantis has been adamant he is working to keep controversy out of Florida classrooms — especially on curriculum surrounding race, gender and identity — the Escambia County School Board had been dealing with the public outcry over each new Florida law that rolls in.

It turns out, Escambia County has a lot to say about these statewide changes. Tuesday night’s school board meeting's public forum was fueled by political crossfire. Some complained about teachers’ inabilities to speak on the atrocities of racism, others on the closure of classroom libraries. Another demanded that the Bible dictate the board’s moral decision-making.

The citizens are urging board members to find their voices and speak in support of their students — the Black ones, the gay ones and transgender ones — and their teachers who feel they are losing more freedom by the day.

“I’m very disappointed in this school district for the direction they are taking on this. Not taking a stand to value the complete and full education of the Escambia County Public School students is very disappointing,” Escambia County mother Giovanna Write-Ledet told the school board. “I do not feel that my students are receiving the best education that they can here in Escambia County, because they are not being fully taught.”

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The common thread amongst parents, teachers and students who addressed the board was that students are capable of a lot more critical thinking than legislators are giving them credit for when it comes to the controversy painted to be over their heads, as opposed to part of their daily lives and social circles.

Escambia County citizen Maurice Moody referenced controversial new Black history standards teach that enslaved people learned valuable skills.

“Slavery was not a benefit to anyone who was enslaved. Just like the Dred Scott decision was not beneficial to Black America, just like the Plessy decision was not beneficial to Black America, and just like redlining was not beneficial to Black America,” Moody said. “These historic and hard truths are not going to damage our precious, white students. I have faith in their resiliency, their desire to learn and their desire to obtain accurate information.”

Joshua Luther, who has pre-filed to run for the Escambia County School Board District 5, disagreed that children are capable of critical thinking, specifically when it comes to gender identity.

“I wanted to make clear something that those who promote perversion have confused — children are generally incapable of critical thought. If they were capable of critical thought, they would not be children,” Luther said. “You do not inform children, you raise them.”

Several Escambia County students who took the podium, such as Tristan Martinez, a Pensacola High School IB senior, thinks otherwise. Particularly regarding taking AP Psychology.

Parents and students are calling on the Escambia County School Board to reconsider putting AP Psychology back on student schedules after making a last-minute decision remove it under the guidance of the Florida Department of Education. Superintendent Keith Leonard said there were about 170 students signed up for the course.

The district was given the option to potentially offer it, but only if the class’s lesson plan was approved in time. According to Leonard, that was a big "if."

Martinez, who had successfully taken and passed the prohibited class, disagreed with the district’s lack of ability to find a way to make the class work.

“This course was, to my knowledge, banned due to its lessons on sexual and gender identity. I took AP Psychology at Pensacola High School and passed the exam with a five. I can state with certainty, that these lessons — so vile, so corrupting that they justified the removal of an entire class — made up less than 1% of the class as a whole,” Martinez said. “Lessons that were not taught to small children for indoctrination, but to young adults seeking a balanced education – many of whom were eligible for the military draft, yet apparently still too frail of mind to learn even mildly controversial subjects.”

Pensacola High School sophomore Josephine Harrell called on the board to change its mind.

“We were all prepared to take a class that we truly would have enjoyed, that would have broadened our horizons and would have likely helped us gain college credit, only for that to be taken away from us only a few days before the school year started. However, I do know one thing: Our voices deserve to be heard,” Harrell said. “I stand in front of you all today to say what I believe is the position of many students and to attempt to protect our educational rights in Escambia County … this is a bad decision, and one that I hope the school board will have the courage to undo.”

Pensacola High School AP Psychology teacher Tara Hartman also spoke up, stating that she had about 70 course requests for the course in her high school alone, that would fill about half of her class periods this school year. The content primarily in question, which she said is based on a psychological theory involving same-sex parents, makes up only one school day in the course. But like any potentially triggering conversations that come up in teaching territory, she always gives her students permission to opt out of that conversation.

“I believe that a simple solution to this could be an opt-in with parental approval, and responsible stewardship of the class. There is no reason our children shouldn’t be able to have the same opportunities in accordance with Florida law,” Hartman said.

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According to Leonard, the district was given mixed messages all the way up until the day before school started. He ultimately landed on the understanding that if the district did allow the course — the teacher would have virtually no autonomy over it.

He was hopeful that the class would be offered through Florida Virtual School as a substitute that Escambia students could tap into but has since found out that is no longer an option.

Leonard and his staff decided it would be in the best interest of the teachers to eliminate the class altogether to protect the district’s teachers.

“Even if I give (Hartman) that lesson plan, she gets zero chance for autonomy. Zero. She may end up answering a question from a very smart Josephine … Josephine asks the question innocently, and really, she’s just yearning to learn, and (Hartman) answers the question. The next thing you know — one student says something to someone else, who says something to someone else — it’s all misconstrued. Now — I’m here to protect her (Hartman.)”

Although Leonard did not oblige to bring the class back, he did offer to come to Pensacola High School to have lunch with each of the three students who spoke.

Although some students, like Martinez, felt Leonard’s response was “incredibly kind”, they are still hopeful that the board will reconsider.

“Students and teachers should be consulted with and be directly apart of the education process,” Martinez said.

What are the Florida education changes driving recent controversies?

One of the driving bills behind recent controversy is HB1557, the Parental Rights in Education Act known as Florida's 'Don't Say Gay' bill, that prohibits instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in Florida classrooms.

The vaguely worded law doesn’t explicitly define the terms “instruction,” “sexual orientation” or “gender identity,” and has led to confusion on everything from books referencing LGBTQ characters, to LGBTQ educators questioning if they need to hide their own identities.

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The Florida Department of Education (FDOE) also voted on July 19 to approve standards that restrict how Black history can be taught in the state.

One of the concepts under this strand includes examining the various duties and trades performed by enslaved people. Underneath this brief description, a benchmark clarification reads: “Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

Most recently, the FDOE announced on Aug. 4 that it was effectively banning AP Psychology in Florida because part of the course that asks students to “describe how sex and gender influence socialization and other aspects of development” is “illegal” under state law.

There was a lot of confusion surrounding how AP psychology can and should be implemented in varying Florida school districts. The FDOE has since given permission for school districts to teach the class, but only if it removes all mention of sexual orientation and gender identity, which is interwoven into the course, according to the College Board, the organization who certifies and approves AP courses.

Brandon Girod contributed to this story.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Escambia County School Board deals with outcry over race, gender