Monday, August 21, 2023

How's your Monday going? I'm Izzie Ramirez, and here's what you need to know today:

Spotlight: Florida's war against sex ed and AP Psychology, briefly explained.

In other news: Hurricane Hilary's record-breaking rainfall, Trump skips this week's debate, and the CDC will overhaul lab operations.  

Also, we're experimenting with the Sentences format to make it as useful and accessible to readers as possible. We'd love to hear what you think. Write us at [email protected] or just reply to this email. 

Florida's restrictive sex ed rules are causing back-to-school mayhem

Thomas Simonetti/Washington Post via Getty Images

Ron DeSantis's next culture war victim: AP Psychology. Thanks to a vague law and even vaguer directions from Florida's Education department, some school district leaders remain unsure if the course is even legal to teach. For the 30,000 students who were registered for the class, they'll have to look for alternatives. 

The lowdown: Earlier this year, Florida's Department of Education asked the College Board — the body that organizes AP classes —  for an audit of the course and to make potential changes.

• The state argued that the course needed to comply with the new House Bill 1096, otherwise known as the "Don't Say Period" law, which states that high school lessons on gender identity and sexual orientation must be "age appropriate."
• The course includes teachings on sexual orientation and gender identity.
• The College Board didn't cave to the state's request, unlike its actions for the AP African American Studies course. 

The stakes: The situation highlights how difficult and confusing it has become for schools to navigate the state's increasingly restrictive education policies. The Don't Say Period act follows the Stop WOKE Act and the Parental Rights in Education law, colloquially known as the Don't Say Gay law.

I spoke with race and policy reporter Fabiola Cineas about how the AP saga is a bellwether of what's to come in education. 

"Essentially every course can be a violation under Florida's tapestry of restrictive classroom laws," Fabiola said. "These laws are all vague and serve to restrict what can be taught in a variety of subjects from history and literature to science and psychology. Teachers are working in fear — they can face felony charges for teaching something that is restricted — and school leaders are struggling to give them direction."

The takeaway: Beyond the state of Florida, the education culture war debacle also indicates ways the 2024 election could go. 

"Ron DeSantis is running for president and has made anti-trans legislation and anti-wokeness a part of his platform," Fabiola added. "Nationally, Republicans are railing against sex and gender as a way to bring the country back to what they say are traditional American values."

Read Fabiola's full piece here.

Hilary slams the West Coast with floods, strong winds

Alfredo Estrella/AFP via Getty Images

Here's what you need to know: 

• Hurricanes in California are extremely rare because cold water flows from Alaska typically make the Pacific coast an unsuitable environment for them. [Vox]
  
  
• The hurricane is now considered a tropical storm, but 25 million people in the West are still under flood warnings. [CNN]
  
  
• Rain records have been shattered, and California is now free of extreme drought conditions for the first time in three years. [New York Times]

🎧 Listen: Could legalizing marijuana help a small, but broke, town? It's complicated.

• The first Republican presidential debate of 2024 is this Wednesday, but Donald Trump won't be joining. The debate is now essentially an opportunity for any of the other candidates — most of whom are polling in the single digits — to have a breakout moment and make the case for why Republican voters should consider them over Trump, writes politics reporter Li Zhou. 
  
  

• The case for optimism around the Supreme Court. Yes, things are pretty dire, but Supreme Court reporter Ian Millhiser explains how his perspective has shifted over the course of the last year, and why he thinks the Court may preserve America's ability to hold fair and free elections. 
  
  
• Speaking of elections, Guatemala is on the verge of electing anti-corruption candidate Bernardo Arévalo. Guatemala suffers from the serious, interconnected problems of violence, inequality, and government corruption — and Arévalo's message holds power, Ellen Ioanes and Nicole Narea report.
  
  
• People forgot how to act in public. You've probably seen countless videos of fans chucking everything from phones to bras at celebrities during concerts. And if you've been back to the movies, maybe you've witnessed a fellow moviegoer with their phone brightness all the way up. Culture reporter Alex Abad-Santos explains how the pandemic affected people's courtesy to each other in public spaces.

• Hawaii's wildfires damaged local crop cultivation. Although the state imports 90 percent of its food supply, the damage from the fires will take years for small-scale farmers and local producers to rebuild. [Axios]
  
  

• Airline close calls happen way more often than anyone would like. Close Calls involving US commercial airlines have been happening multiple times a week on average, according to a New York Times investigative report. A large factor: the shortage of air traffic controllers. [New York Times]
  
  
• A California woman was shot dead after an argument over a Pride flag hanging outside of her clothing store. The 66-year-old victim was not LGBTQ+, but advocated for those in the community. The shooting comes as the LGBTQ+ community continues to face ramped up threats of violence. [CNN]
  
  
• The CDC will overhaul lab operations after 2020's Covid test flop. Remember when it took forever to get Covid tests in early 2020? Well, an independent panel of lab researchers and experts analyzed the CDC's operations, and provided recommendations to help speed processes along the next time there's a pandemic. [KFF Health News]

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