{"id":34965,"date":"2023-08-23T10:08:16","date_gmt":"2023-08-23T14:08:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=34965"},"modified":"2023-08-23T10:08:19","modified_gmt":"2023-08-23T14:08:19","slug":"polk-county-schools-will-no-longer-do-any-proclamations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2023\/08\/23\/polk-county-schools-will-no-longer-do-any-proclamations\/","title":{"rendered":"Polk County Schools will no longer do any proclamations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The topic that divided Polk County school board members Tuesday was one that rarely causes a stir.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

During a lengthy meeting, board members debated whether Polk County Public Schools should discontinue its normally-perfunctory proclamations, which mark annual occasions like Black History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month, and Disability Awareness Month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dozens showed up \u2014 teachers, students, and community members \u2014 to speak for and against the district\u2019s proclamations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cesar Ramirez was one of the speakers who implored school board members to continue the tradition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to be a Hispanic-American anymore. I\u2019m an American. I\u2019m a third-generation American. Father fought in Vietnam. Grandfather fought in World War II,\u201d he said. \u201cThese proclamations allow us to represent that history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ramirez and others argued the proclamations are part of education and make all students and staff feel welcome in Polk County schools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cRepresentation matters, not just for our students but for our teachers and our staff,\u201d added Stephanie Yocum, the Polk County Education Association president.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Others, however, argued the district has too many proclamations and has become too focused on them over more pressing issues like strengthening academics and improving test scores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy don\u2019t we have a month for math? A month for English? A month for science?\u201d one community member asked board members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meeting, board member Rick Nolte made a similar argument before motioning to discontinue all proclamations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLet\u2019s put our children first \u2014 their education,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anita Carson, however, thinks an ulterior motive led to the push to end proclamations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Field and Advocacy Manager with Equality Florida, who lives in Davenport and is a former Polk County teacher, said the district\u2019s proclamations policy was only called into question and deemed \u201cdivisive\u201d after some spoke out against proclaiming June as Pride Month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She sees the effort to do away with all proclamations as a thinly-veiled slight of Polk County\u2019s LGBTQ community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe timing makes it really hard for me to believe that this was not done in animus,” Carson said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meeting, despite arguments from Carson and others, the board voted 5-to-2 to discontinue issuing proclamations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Board members like Lori Cunningham assured that the district celebrates diversity with or without proclamations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe accept all children because we do,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are the public school system.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She and other board members who voted to end proclamations said they still support recognizing students and teachers of all backgrounds for their individual achievements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, board member Lisa Miller \u2014 one of the two members who voted against discontinuing proclamations \u2014 thinks that practice will cause people to feel left out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The topic that divided Polk County school board members Tuesday was one that rarely causes a stir. During a lengthy meeting, board members debated whether Polk County Public Schools should… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34966,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[5767],"class_list":["post-34965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-polk-county-schools-will-no-longer-do-any-proclamations"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}