Happy New Year 2014!

New Life To Our Schools, Students and Teachers

Each New Year brings new goals, new desires, and new hopes. This year great change is needed in Florida’s public school laws and governances.  It is my hope and my prayer that the when the Florida State Legislator meets for the 2014 session that common sense, rational thinking and positive non-partisan solutions are agreed on and passed.  This includes changes that would not only give clear direction on Florida’s education standards and state assessments, but also includes Legislative intervention into the Duke Energy lawsuits and its damaging reduction of funding to our Citrus schools and classrooms.

This past 2013 year, the school board and district often had to make decisions, choosing the lesser of two bad options.  This past year also saw the state’s implementation of a widely criticized and flawed school grading system, which begins with a controversial single day “high-stakes” assessment test (FCAT 2.0 or EOC) and finishes with 50% of a teacher’s evaluations being based on these controversial assessments as well as students’ lives being determined by these “high-stakes” assessment tests.  In 2013 we saw at the beginning of the year a “non-negotiable” expectation and mandates by the Florida Department of Education (FL-DOE), State Legislator and Florida Governor that all curriculums must be aligned to the Common Core State Standards and with what then the Governor and FL-DOE described as an improved “high-stakes” assessment test the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) would be the answer to all the negative issues of FCAT and FCAT 2.0. Then at the end of 2013, the Governor and Department of Education abandoned PARCC, and are now rethinking the whole Common Core standards and looking to now develop new Florida standards which may look similar to Common Core.  In the meantime due to the mandates to Common Core and the use of Common Core assessments for teacher evaluations millions of dollars locally and perhaps billion statewide have been spent preparing and transitioning for these requirements. Now with the changes being suggested by political groups and the Governor districts have had to find a way to fund these mandates by often cutting in others areas. Will that money now be in vain? I hope not.  This legislative session will be another important one as several education changes are likely to take place and I will do my best to help keep you informed and how you can help.

This coming year no doubt will have its sure of challenges and successes. I encourage each of us in our many different roles as parents, teachers, educators, staff and community to work hard to recognize the problems that we must fix but remember as hard as it can be to stay optimistic and to focus on the positive parts of public education.

May we, through our schools and students continue to be blessed in our great county.

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