Yet transient references to a personality’s homosexual crush apparently infected dad or mum and Hernando County School Board member Shannon Rodriguez to the purpose the place she felt she needed to take swift motion towards the trainer who confirmed the movie. Believing she had a non secular obligation to protect college students from such content material, she notified the varsity of the homosexual character’s presence within the film and met with the trainer to voice her frustration.
The trainer, Jenna Barbee, says Rodriguez additionally reported her to the Florida Department of Education and that she is now below investigation by the state.
After Barbee spoke out in regards to the controversy at a May 9 faculty board assembly, Rodriguez, sitting atop the dais, stated the PG-rated film marred her little one.
“You confirmed a film that wasn’t sanctioned faculty materials, thus stripping the innocence of my 10-year-old,” Rodriguez stated, addressing the trainer straight.
Rodriguez went on to say, “I’m right here to remain.”
“And sure, you possibly can snort, however God did put me right here. So God has good issues, and he has large issues coming.”
Barbee confirmed Strange World to college students, together with Rodriguez’s 10-year-old, in Hernando County’s Winding Waters Ok-8 faculty in early May following a morning of end-of-year standardized exams. While Barbee says college students had signed permission slips to observe PG-rated motion pictures, Rodriguez claims the trainer failed to make sure the film was expressly permitted as classroom materials.
The film depicts a gaggle of explorers on the hunt for a uncommon plant that gives vitality for his or her society. One of its characters, a 16-year-old, is homosexual, which turns into evident when his dad references {the teenager}’s crush.
Barbee says the movie touches on ecology and environmental stewardship, themes that she felt match into her lesson plan. She insists the character’s sexual orientation had nothing to do along with her determination to point out the film.
“I selected this film as a result of it pertains to our curriculum. Our unit on the time was earth science and ecosystems and the way they work together: crops, people, and animals. So this film was excellent,” Barbee stated in a TikTok video. “Is a personality within the film LGBTQ? Absolutely. Is that why I confirmed it? No.”
But due to the Florida Board of Education’s “Don’t Say Gay” guidelines, Rodriguez made headway when she reported Barbee for “indoctrination,” prompting the Florida Department of Education to launch an investigation into the trainer for potential violation of the coverage banning the educating of gender id and sexual orientation, Barbee says.
Barbee, a first-year trainer, is in peril of suspension or dropping her job altogether, she says.
“The phrase indoctrination is thrown round rather a lot proper now, however evidently those that are utilizing it are utilizing it as a protection tactic for their very own fear-based beliefs with out understanding the true that means of the phrase,” Barbee argued on the current faculty board assembly.
@becomingabetterbarbee I’m the trainer. Here is the reality. #indoctrination #disneymovie #disney #strangeworld #viraltweet ♬ authentic sound – Jenna Lynn
Signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis final 12 months, the Parental Rights in Education Act (AKA Don’t Say Gay invoice) prohibits instruction of gender id and sexual orientation in school rooms till fourth grade. In April, the Board of Education applied guidelines that apply related restrictions by means of the top of highschool.
The legislation and accompanying guidelines have induced rampant confusion amongst educators throughout the state as they wrestle to know the boundaries of the rules. It’s devolved to the purpose the place lecturers are involved that they’re going to be punished for educating about historic developments in civil rights, such because the landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling establishing the precise of same-sex {couples} to marry.
Rodriguez mentioned her disdain for Strange World throughout the May 9 assembly.
“While chances are you’ll really feel a PG film will not be a matter of utmost significance, know that this is just one instance of your kids being uncovered to controversial points that haven’t any place in faculties,” Rodriguez continued.
“God bless each one in all you,” she stated to shut the assembly.
Rodriguez’s run for a Hernando School Board seat was endorsed by the right-wing group Moms for Liberty, which campaigns to elect conservative faculty board members and advocates for faculties’ elimination of books that the group finds objectionable.Â
She secured her seat in a victory over incumbent board member Jimmy Lodato in August 2022, successful 60 p.c of the vote. A nursing faculty graduate, she has lived in Hernando County for greater than 36 years and runs an auto restore store along with her husband.
In an interview with the Hernando Sun previous to her election, Rodriguez stated that one of many greatest points plaguing the varsity district was a “curriculum centered round political ideology versus educating expertise important for the workforce and life typically.” She lamented that kids “are graduating with out the flexibility to endorse a paycheck in cursive” and “learn the Declaration of Independence because it was meant to be learn.”
Rodriguez has emerged as conservative mother and father’ most vocal voice on the board in current weeks as the varsity district has been embroiled in controversy over alleged feedback made by a trans trainer to directors at Fox Chapel Middle School in March after she noticed college students making disparaging remarks on-line about her sexual orientation. Parents grew to become incensed that the trainer, who’s accused of constructing a reference to capturing college students, was not instantly faraway from campus.
The Disney film controversy was overshadowed for a number of days by the fallout from the Fox Chapel uproar as superintendent John Stratton confronted calls to resign over the latter incident. A movement for a vote of no confidence towards Stratton was backed by Rodriguez and a fellow board member, although the measure was tabled on the May 9 assembly.
After Barbee posted her social media video this previous weekend in regards to the disciplinary motion she’s dealing with, the story was lined within the Tallahassee Democrat earlier than making nationwide headlines.
Strange World featured Disney’s first brazenly homosexual teen character, voiced by comic Jaboukie Young-White. The movie was launched in November 2022, starring characters voiced by actors Jake Gyllenhaal, Dennis Quaid, and Lucy Liu. Even earlier than it hit theaters, it was drawing backlash from outstanding spiritual conservative figures corresponding to Ben Shapiro, who argued that Disney was making an attempt to indoctrinate kids by together with a homosexual teenager within the plot.
Disney’s public opposition to the Parental Rights in Education Act final 12 months created a rift with Gov. DeSantis’ workplace, which preceded the authorized battle presently brewing between the State of Florida and Disney over the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District the place Disney’s Orlando theme parks function.
While talking throughout a county faculty board assembly final week, Barbee insisted that the Strange World scenes inflicting a stir are on no account sexual. In the six-minute TikTok video she posted over the weekend, Barbee emphasised that the character’s sexual orientation had nothing to do along with her determination to play the film.
“I’m not pushing something, simply being accepting,” Barbee stated. “That’s what I do.”
“The mother and father within the film kiss, rather a lot. And that wasn’t even introduced up,” Barbee added.
My buddy confirmed Disney’s Strange World in a Florida classroom and one pupil reported it to their mother and father. Now she’s below investigation by the state.
Florida will not be protected for lecturers, DO NOT MOVE HERE. pic.twitter.com/rZJPdadz28
— Carl Zee (@c350Zee) May 11, 2023
Barbee is the daughter of Hernando County circuit choose Don Barbee, who previously served because the county’s clerk of courtroom. As disclosed by Barbee after she got here into the nationwide highlight, she confronted authorized hassle seven years in the past when she was charged for allegedly stealing cash from a money register on the Target the place she labored.
On May 11, Twitter consumer @c350Zee posted a photograph of a letter from the Florida Department of Education to a redacted recipient with the caption: “My buddy confirmed Disney’s Strange World in a Florida classroom and one pupil reported it to their mother and father. Now she’s below investigation by the state.”
“Florida will not be protected for lecturers, DO NOT MOVE HERE,” the message reads.
The letter states that the Florida Department of Education’s Office of Professional Practices Services decided that an “investigation is warranted into allegations that [the teacher] engaged in inappropriate conduct.”
The faculty district confirmed in a press release {that a} fifth-grade trainer is being investigated for exhibiting the Disney film and warranted mother and father that “sooner or later, this film won’t be proven.”
“Yesterday, the Disney film Strange World was proven in your kid’s classroom,” the varsity district wrote within the assertion. “While not the primary plot of the film, elements of the story contain a male character having and expressing emotions for an additional male character… The faculty administration and the district’s Professional Standards Dept. is presently reviewing the matter to see if additional corrective motion is required.”
As a part of the state investigation, Barbee claimed her 10- and 11-year-old college students at the moment are being plucked from class by officers for interrogation — one thing she worries will traumatize them greater than a fleeting publicity to a homosexual character.
“Their trainer confirmed a film to assist them hook up with our curriculum and study some worthwhile life classes,” Barbee stated. “Now, admin is of their room, pulling their trainer out, calling the scholars one after the other right down to the workplace to interrogate them in the course of my classes.”