Florida Showcases Elements of Critical Race Theory in Textbooks

Florida Showcases Elements of Critical Race Theory in Textbooks

April 22, 2022

The Florida Department of Education showcased some examples this week of “problematic elements” of Critical Race Theory (CRT) in recently-reviewed textbook materials for students.

After rejecting 41 percent of submitted math textbooks for students due to the inclusion of Common Core and CRT, the Florida DoE released examples of the “problematic elements of the recently reviewed instructional materials.”

“These examples do not represent an exhaustive list of input received by the Department,” the department said in a disclaimer, noting that it is continuing to give publishers a chance to “remediate all deficiencies identified during the review to ensure the broadest selection of high quality instructional materials are available to the school districts and Florida’s students.”

One of the examples, from a math textbook, demonstrates the presence of CRT. In an application exercise, students are presented with a bar graph based on the Implicit Association Test, which supposedly measures levels of racial prejudice. Another bar graph uses this test to measure racial prejudice based on party identification, suggesting that conservatives are more racist than leftists.

Another snippet shows a section dubbed “social and emotional learning,” with a goal of students building “proficiency with social awareness as they practice with empathizing with classmates.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has made it clear that there is no need for “things like social and emotional learning and some of the other things that are more political” in textbooks, adding that it “doesn’t meet” the state’s standards.

“When you do social, emotional learning, CRT, things like that into a math program just simply violates the standards,” he said.

“I think what parents in Florida want to know is, can I send my kid to be educated or am I basically sending them to get indoctrinated with whatever some of these people in the education establishment from up on high do,” he added.

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