Schools

The Escambia school board voted 5-0 to remove hundreds of books without review. The books in question come from the Florida Department of Education's book removal list.

Pinellas and Sarasota counties earned A’s, while Polk was the only district to improve its grade. Factors used to determine grades include state testing in English, math, science and social studies and grad rates.

School districts will be mandated under new law to provide low-cost electrocardiograms to student-athletes in Grades 9-12. The tests can detect deadly heart conditions.

The yearslong dispute is about whether the school should have been barred from offering a prayer over a stadium loudspeaker before an FHSAA football championship game.

The law prohibits cellphone use throughout the school day in elementary and middle schools and creates a pilot program that prevents cellphone use in some high schools.

Florida was the first state to pass a law regulating use of cellphones in schools in 2023 and has another bill awaiting the governor's signature this year. Alaska and Nebraska just became the 25th and 26th.

The Legislature passed a bill barring elementary and middle school students from using cellphones during the school day and testing the idea in high schools.

The school will ask the high court to overturn a decision last year by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that sided with the FHSAA over a prayer on a stadium loudspeaker before a football game.

Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka says the proposal would not cut funding by half but instead return that money to districts through other sources. Many school district officials disagree with that characterization.

Most on the American Library Association's list include explicit descriptions of sexual enounters, along with LGBTQ+ themes and characters, sexual abuse, and references to drug addiction, racism and slavery.

The Republican-controlled chamber passed two bills along party lines to carry out President Donald Trump’s directive to rename what has been known as the Gulf of Mexico for centuries.

Under the legislation, school district committees reviewing a challenged book wouldn’t be able to consider literary or artistic merit when deciding to remove it.