Florida has been a national leader in seeking ways to personalize education for K-12 students. Hispanics, who account for more than one-fourth of Floridians, have been a primary beneficiary of these policies.
New efforts to expand opportunities even further will certainly continue that trend.
A bill by state Sen. Manny Diaz Jr. would streamline and expand existing programs, to ensure that more families have more access to an education that works for them, wherever they might live.
No kid should have their educational opportunities limited by their ZIP code. But many still do, despite the strides we’ve made over the past few years.
The COVID-19 pandemic crystallized the challenges faced by families caught in a one-size-fits-all system. Schools struggled to respond to the individual needs of students. Parents were caught in the middle.
They responded admirably, devising their own innovative ways to keep their children engaged in learning.
Now it’s time for Florida’s schools to be as innovative as Florida’s families. That means reassessing a system that is not meeting the needs of every child. Hispanic children would be a primary beneficiary of such a transformation.
According to the National Center of Education Statistics, Hispanics comprise one-third of charter school students nationwide, and more than 10% were enrolled in private schools as of 2017. Of all students in the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship Program, one of the programs that Diaz’s legislation would make even better, 38% are Hispanic.
We are a resilient community, but the pandemic threw many of us for a loop.
A national poll by Latino Decisions, 59% of Hispanic households are “very concerned” that their kids could be exposed to the coronavirus at school, 52% expect to have technical troubles with online learning, 34% do not have access to high-speed Wi-Fi, and 36% “do not have anyone who can stay home” to supervise their children’s online classes.
Diaz’s bill would address such concerns by consolidating five existing programs into two, and by expanding education savings accounts. The greater flexibility provided by ESAs can help solve many of the problems that traditional scholarships aimed only at tuition do not address.
ESAs can be used to pay for at-home curriculums, computer hardware and software, training materials, tutoring, supplies and other approved items, in addition to traditional school tuition.
It’s a vision of an education that can inspire any parent who wants their children to have the best chance to realize their potential.
These reforms can be a starting point.
Florida has come a long way, but too many of our kids are still enrolled in top-down systems that leave too many wondering how they can rise to the top themselves.
The COVID-19 pandemic has been a tragedy for many, and it has posed great challenges to others. But out of this crisis we have a chance to seize an opportunity. We have seen first-hand what motivated communities can do when the status quo failed and threatened to leave us all behind.
Parents taught their kids. Families organized neighborhood pods to ease the burden on each other. Micro schools arose. Our communities came together to meet the challenge. Now we have a chance for our state government to join us in this project.
Let’s start now to create a system that focuses on students instead of systems. Let’s urge our legislators to pass the Diaz bill, and to bring families, teachers, and the community together to build a better future.
Juan M. Martinez is engagement director for The LIBRE Initiative-Florida.
