{"id":3016,"date":"2017-12-16T11:49:19","date_gmt":"2017-12-16T16:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=3016"},"modified":"2017-12-16T11:49:19","modified_gmt":"2017-12-16T16:49:19","slug":"the-time-for-action-is-now-in-marion-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=3016","title":{"rendered":"The time for action is now in Marion County"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Do you live in Marion County? If you don’t, do you have friends, family or colleagues in Marion County? It’s time to get work there.<\/p>\n

Marion County Public Schools recently issued this press release<\/a>:<\/p>\n

MARION COUNTY \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Marion County Public Schools is the first school district in Florida to adopt its own textbooks, breaking a long-standing practice of relying on the state to approve books for the classroom.<\/p>\n

Since November 1, dozens of volunteers including parents, teachers and other community members have reviewed textbooks in 17 subject areas at all grade levels. Their recommendations were then presented to Superintendent Dr. Heidi Maier.<\/p>\n

Maier will present her recommendations to the Marion County School Board in early 2018. The public online access window to view copies of all recommended student editions, now required by state law, is open and available at www.marionschools.net. Individuals wanting to review and comment on proposed textbooks should click the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Recommended Textbook Adoption Information Here\u00e2\u20ac\u009d under the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Important Messages\u00e2\u20ac\u009d tab. Comments may be presented in person to the School Board at a January 9, 2018 public hearing. The Board will vote on all recommended titles on February 13, 2018. Following the Board vote, a 30-day objection window opens to the public. If necessary, a public hearing on all formal objections will be held in March, as required by state law.<\/p>\n

For more information, call 352.867.2121.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I’m familiar with the science textbooks on Marion County’s recommended list. You can see the list at this link<\/a> (which goes to a pdf). They’re from major publishing companies and there are no surprises that I can find. That’s the good news.<\/p>\n

However, there’s a very good chance that the creationist, climate-change-denying group Florida Citizens’ Alliance will be out in full force during the public hearing process. At least one member of the Alliance’s advisory council is in Marion County. That means we need YOU to be out in force, too.<\/p>\n

Keep in mind that there was a recent news report that stated Marion County got complaints about their science textbooks<\/a>. When I followed up with a public records request for anything on those protests I was told that it was all verbal complaints<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And Marion County has some history of accommodating creationists. In chapter eight of my book Going Ape<\/em><\/a> I mentioned that the Marion County School District bought materials advocating intelligent design in 2005 (the book Of Pandas and People<\/em> and the DVD Unlocking the Mystery of Life<\/em>) for placement in the libraries of all seven of their high schools. The superintendent at that time said, “We’re dealing with it as a controversial issue. We’re just trying to be open and honest and address what it is.”<\/p>\n

What will happen in Marion County in 2018? It’s up to you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you live in Marion County? If you don’t, do you have friends, family or colleagues in Marion County? It’s time to get work there. Marion County Public Schools recently issued this press release: MARION COUNTY \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Marion County Public … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-ME","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2901,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2901","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":0},"title":"Marion County to review and approve textbooks on their own","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"There's a new wrinkle in the Florida instructional materials world. We already know that the Florida Department of Education is in the process of reviewing and approving new science textbooks that school districts could then pick from to purchase for their schools. We already know that two new laws could\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Textbooks"","block_context":{"text":"Textbooks","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=26"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2945,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2945","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":1},"title":"Marion County got complaints about science textbooks","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"November 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Rather than use the traditional approach of choosing instructional materials from a list vetted and approved by the Florida Department of Education, Marion County is the first school district to forgo the list and review and select textbooks on their own. I posted that interesting news back in September. Unfortunately,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Textbooks"","block_context":{"text":"Textbooks","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=26"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2969,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2969","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":2},"title":"Teaching that global warming is caused by human activity is “blatant indoctrination”","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"November 26, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The Associated Press issued a story today about the new Instructional Materials bill approved by our Florida legislature and signed by our governor earlier this year:\u00c2\u00a0New Florida law expected to increase conflict over textbooks. Reporter Terry Spencer took on the massive task of asking every Florida school district for records\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Instructional Materials bills '17"","block_context":{"text":"Instructional Materials bills '17","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=32"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2906,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=2906","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":3},"title":"“Pure and unadulterated false propaganda”","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 30, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"It's been mighty quiet out there, folks. A month ago I told you that the Florida Department of Education launched their instructional materials review for science and they were accepting applications for reviewers. The response from all of you was awesome and I'm confident several of you applied. So, now\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Textbooks"","block_context":{"text":"Textbooks","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=26"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3348,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=3348","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":4},"title":"Voter Guides II: “Both the strengths and weaknesses of evolution should be taught.”","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"August 12, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"A couple of conservative organizations recently released a new batch of voter guides for school board races in Indian River, Lee and Clay counties. In a previous post I highlighted voter guides for Lake, Marion and St. Lucie counties. The Indian River County voter guide, issued by the group Florida\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=3348#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Your-Vote-Counts-297x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3224,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=3224","url_meta":{"origin":3016,"position":5},"title":"Science textbook removed from adoption consideration in Marion County","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"March 10, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"I've been doing my best to fill in the blanks and obtain updates on my earlier post\u00c2\u00a0March is a busy month for science textbook adoptions. In that post I listed every Florida school district and what each one's science textbook adoption schedule is. Unfortunately, there are a lot of blanks\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Textbooks"","block_context":{"text":"Textbooks","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=26"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3016"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3016"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3019,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3016\/revisions\/3019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}