Florida Legislature Seeks to Expand Parental Rights Law

The Florida legislature this week is seeking to expand the Parental Rights in Education law, applying restrictions on inappropriate classroom discussions on sexual orientation and gender identity up to eighth grade, up from third grade as currently enshrined in the law signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) nearly one year ago.

DeSantis signed House Bill (HB) 1557, otherwise as the Parental Rights in Education bill, into law on March 28, 2022. The bill ensures that parents will be notified by schools of any healthcare services offered at the school and “ensures that whenever a questionnaire or health screening is given to K-3 students, parents receive it first and provide permission for the school to administer the questionnaire or health screening to their child,” as described by the governor’s office. 

The bill came under scrutiny from far-leftists for prohibiting classroom discussions on sexual orientation and gender identity for children in kindergarten through third grade. Far-leftists, however, falsely called the bill “Don’t Say Gay,” despite the fact that it does not arbitrarily ban a word or phrase. The word “gay” does not even appear in the text. 

At the time, surveys showed that most voters supported the Parental Rights in Education bill.

The text of the new bill extends the prohibition of classroom discussions on sexual orientation or gender identity “from occurring in prekindergarten through grade 8, rather than kindergarten through grade 3.” Further, the bill states that any instruction on those topics for children in 9th grade through 12th grade must be “developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards.”

The bill also prohibits “employees, contractors, and students of such educational institutions from being required to use, from providing, and from being asked to provide certain titles and pronouns.”

The bill states in part:

It shall be the policy of every public K-12 educational institution that is provided or authorized by the Constitution and laws of Florida that a person’s sex is an immutable biological trait and that it is false to ascribe to a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.

Read the bill’s text here.