Florida rejects 54 math textbooks citing CRT concerns

As Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis continues to lead a push to reform education standards and practices across the Sunshine State, Florida’s Department of Education announced on Friday that the state had rejected 41% -- or 54 of 132 submitted textbooks – representing the highest rejection rate in the state’s history.

In a statement, the department noted that 28 textbooks were rejected because “they incorporate prohibited topics or unsolicited strategies, including CRT.”

Department officials further stated that the inclusion of social emotional learning (SEL) and Common Core in the textbooks was among some of the state’s reasons for rejecting some mathematical materials.

Although proponents of SEL have defended the methodology as a model designed to help students develop healthy relationships and identities, manage their emotions and make responsible choices, many conservatives have come to believe that the programming is a vehicle for teaching CRT in the classroom, Fox News reported.

“It seems that some publishers attempted to slap a coat of paint on an old house built on the foundation of Common Core, and indoctrinating concepts like race essentialism, especially, bizarrely, for elementary school students,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said in a statement about the math book rejections. 

“I’m grateful that [Florida Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran] and his team at the Department have conducted such a thorough vetting of these textbooks to ensure they comply with the law.”

The move comes as conservative lawmakers across the country move to ban CRT and the discussion of race and gender in public classrooms, especially in lower grades.

The teaching of CRT in classrooms was banned in Florida just last year, after which DeSantis criticized CRT, saying it is a form of “state-sanctioned racism” and that it “teaches kids to hate our country and hate each other.”

Democrats, however, were quick to blast the move on social media.

“#DeSantis is hysterically pulling math books outta FL schools claiming they ‘indoctrinate’ kids with CRT,” tweetedDemocratic state Rep. Carlos Guillermo Smith. “This isn’t just crazy right-wing pandering— next they’ll spend MILLIONS of tax dollars forcing schools to buy math books from GOP campaign donors.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if Florida Republican leaders are preparing to ban Algebra from high schools. They object to the subliminal use of [brackets] as an indoctrination to the concept of inclusion, they don’t like the equal sign, and they hate solving problems!” Democratic state Rep. Anna Eskamani tweeted.