Florida Board of Education approves controversial standards for teaching Black history

Florida’s Board of Education approved new rules for teaching Black history in the state Wednesday, prompting immediate backlash from critics who describe the updated standards as “a big step backward.” 

The guidelines follow the state’s enacting of a controversial education law that requires lessons on race be taught in an “objective” manner that does not seek to “indoctrinate or persuade students to a particular point of view.” The state also prohibited a pilot Advanced Placement high school course on African American studies earlier this year, saying it violated state law and “lacks educational value.” 

The updated standards on African American history instruction include “benchmark clarifications” to provide additional guidance to teachers on specific topics for instruction. One updated standard that has drawn particularly strong outcry directs teachers to include instruction on “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

Another “benchmark clarification” under increased scrutiny directs teachers to include instruction on “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans” when teaching about the growth and destruction of Black communities during Reconstruction and beyond. Among the examples listed as an act of violence was the 1920 Ocoee (Fla.) Massacre in which dozens of African Americans were killed when they went to vote.