Letter to Jeb Bush's 'Foundation for Florida's Future'

April 30, 2009 DRAFT LETTER

Kristy Cambell
Communications DirectorFoundation for Florida’s Future
kristy@afloridapromise.org

http://www.foundationforfloridasfuture.org/who_we_are.php?sub_page_id=25


Dear Ms. Cambell,

In what way, if any, does the Foundation for Florida’s Future have a role for ensuring that students in Florida’s public schools will be given the requisite skills for historical knowledge and citizenship that will enable them to lead productive lives as participants in the democratic process? Civics, History, Social Studies (whatever we wish to call it) represents a majority of what is commonly referred to as Florida’s Required Instruction Act (FS1003.42), but by statute it is not even required to be taken into consideration when a student is being promoted from one grade to the next at the elementary grades. (A former Florida Chancellor of Public Schools supported adding social studies to the state’s Student Progression Law and despite unanimous approval one year by the Florida House of Representatives and the entire Senate Education Committee, this bill also somehow ‘died’.)
For over 22 years social studies educators have REQUESTED accountability from the state for the efforts they make in classrooms each day. Repeated attempts to introduce legislation to address this need seem to be stalled almost every year.
Over two-thirds of approximately 1700 elementary teachers across Florida admit they teach civics and history less than 2 hours per week. They must wonder why teach it at all, of it’s not even needing to be considered for grade promotion. Florida is only one of two southern states not assessing social studies in any way at some grade level. We have been told by former key legislators that because subjects like American History are taught in a widely different manner in many different areas of the state depending upon local needs and demographics that it would be very difficult to assess Social Studies in Florida. I personally believe that if the legislature as a whole believed this, it would be a recipe for state and national disaster. Already our former adversaries are almost gleefully predicting the dismemberment of the United States in 2010.
Numerous reports abound about the lack of knowledge our students have about their own nation’s history and its governmental and economic system. I need not list them all here. Our state has been criticized in the by national leaders in the Congressional House and Senate for its shortsightedness. Having lobbied for over one generation for the state to live up to its civic responsibility, I would be very interested in what how Foundation is planning to address this crisis. I would be most delighted to see some literature from the Foundation or your plan for how our state may reverse this dangerous course.

Sincerely,

Jack Bovee
Legislative Chair, Florida Association of Social Studies Supervisors and the Florida Council for the Social Studies