Meet Florida’s (Scary) New Ed Leadership

The Orlando Sentinel published a scathing article this week, calling newly appointed Chair of the Florida House’s Chair of the Education Committee, Jennifer Sullivan “in no way qualified to be a top education policy-maker in a state where the education system is shamefully poor and needs dramatic change.”

“Sullivan, 27, a Mount Dora Republican whose district covers north Orange County and most of Lake, was home-schooled. She lived with her mom and worked as a tea room waitress and babysitter before she was elected.

Social media went wild. Rep. Sullivan’s ascendancy should come as no surprise, however, to anyone closely following Ed policy in Florida. Last year Sullivan served as vice-chair of that very same committee. She has been successfully carrying ALEC and Foundation For Florida’s Future education bills for several years now. During Jeb Bush’s “Tally Talks” before last year’s session, she excitedly told the former governor (at 46:35) that she would be “running” his personalized learning bill that session and engaged him in conversation regarding exciting vendors she had met at Bush’s Excelined Summit. She appears to be a team player.

The Sentinel suggested “Only the most experienced and qualified legislators — those with exemplary skills and a demeanor that encourages compromise — should be in charge of this critical issue (Education).”

A closer look at this year’s committee assignments reveals Rep. Sullivan isn’t the only Education Committee member without a college degree, nor is she the only Chair.

The following is a look at the qualification of this session’s Education Committee members. To date, the remainder of the House Education committee membership, as well as the leadership and membership of the House’s three Education related subcommittees (PreK-12 Appropriations PreK-12 Innovation and PreK-12 Quality), have not been announced. Committee Weeks start next week. There are currently no meetings scheduled. Of course, last year, the House Education committee only met once during Committee Weeks, and then suggested they needed to create another Train Bill (7055) because they ran out of time to hear all the bills separately. Sadly, train bills have become commonplace in Florida over the past few years. As demonstrated by 2017’s HB7069, Florida legislators routinely attach the worst education policies (i.e. “Schools of Hope” corporate charter expansion) to more palatable and desirable policies, like recess or the expansion of funding for special needs children; in other words children are used as pawn in a political game to pass damaging legislation.

On the Senate side, first term Senator Manny Diaz Jr has been appointed Chair of the Education Committee and Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Education. Diaz has a Bachelors degree from St. Thomas University and a Masters in Educational Leadership from NOVA Southern University. Diaz lists his occupation as “College Administrator.” He works for Doral College, a private unaccredited college that provides Dual Enrollment courses to Academica charter school students. The college is owned and affiliated with Academica, one of Florida’s largest and most profitable charter school corporations. You can learn more about the unusual relationship between Academica and Doral College here. Prior to his election to the Florida Senate, Mr. Diaz served in the Florida House and was a champion of charter schools and school choice. Over the years, Diaz has championed legislation that has directly benefited his employer, Academica (for example, read here and here). According to an interview with Florida Politics, his plans for the state’s education system this session include “a continued push for charter school support, and an expansion of the school guardian program put into effect after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland.”

Vice Chair of the Senate Education Committee is Senator Bill Montford. Montford is a former superintendent and the current CEO of the Florida Association of District School Superintendents (FADSS). He has a Masters degree and a Bachelors degree from Florida State University. Montford broke with Senate Democrats to vote for 2018’s HB7055, arguing the good in the bill outweighed the bad. His Yes vote allowed the bill to pass. HB7055 DID allow some flexibility in construction rules and in spending of federal Title I dollars (for low income students). The bad, though, was pretty bad: including a direct attack on the certification of teachers unions (but not fire or police unions), the expansion of vouchers to private schools via a disingenuous “Bully Bill” which would, among other things, divert auto registration fees away from the General Revenue, and the establishment of a private reading scholarship for students failing the FSA allowing them to use a voucher for private tutoring, etc (this was the “camel nose under the tent” which will be used to expand and directly fund ESAs or Education Savings Accounts, a voucher that can be used to purchase education in a piecemeal fashion).

There are two lawyers on the Senate Ed committee: David Simmons (JD, Vanderbilt University Law School) and Lori Berman (JD George Washington University Law School). Berman served in the Florida House from 2010-2018. She was elected to the Florida Senate, during a special election, on 4/10/2018. Senator Simmons was once the Chair of Ed Appropriations, but lost that role last year seemingly as payback for voting against the massive HB7069 during the 2017 session. This year, Simmons will serve on both Education and Ed Appropriations and is Senate President Pre Tempore, a leadership position.

Senator Dennis Baxley will, also, serve on both the Ed and Ed appropriations committees this session. He has a Bachelors degree from FSA and an AS in Funeral Services from Miami-Dade College. He is employed as a Funeral Director. He has supported the expansion of school choice and the protection of religious expression in public schools.

Senator Janet Cruz will serve her first year on the Senate Ed committee. She served in the Florida House from 2010 to 2018 and was House Minority Leader from 2016-218. She has a degree in Opticianry Dispensing from Hillsborough Community College. An Optician, she owns and operates Pearle Vision.

Senator Keith Perry will serve on the Education Committee. From 2010-16, he served in the Florida House, where he served on several Education Committees. He has a high school diploma from Buchholz High School in Gainesville and works as a Roofing Contractor.

Senator Kelli Stargel will chair the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Education, as well as serve on the Senate Education Committee. In 2008, she was elected to the Florida House. When legislative districts were redrawn in 2012, she ran for Florida Senate rather than seek re-election. She has been a staunch supporter of school choice and championed the use of VAM, a controversial algorithm that grades teachers based on student test scores. She, like Rep Sullivan, has never completed college. She graduated from Land O Lakes High School in 1984. She later attended Tallahassee Community College in 1991, though she did not graduate.

Stargel, Diaz, Bailey, Montford and Simmons will all serve on the Appropriations Subcommittee on Education along with:

Attorney Anitere Flores served in the Florida House from 2004 until 2010, when she was elected to the Florida Senate. She is a supporter of charter schools and school choice. She has a law degree from the University of Florida. In the past, she was employed by the charter school giant, Academica, as the President of Doral College. She is now the Director of Development for the ACE Foundation, which raises money for Title I charter schools, including Academica’s Mater Academy and other charter schools that do business with Doral.

Senator Lauren Book is an Educator and the Minority (Democratic) Leader Pro Tempore, 2016-2018. She has a Bachelors degree in Elementary Education and Creative Writing. She has a Master’s degree in Education. She is the Founder/CEO of Lauren’s Kids, a non-profit with the goal of preventing child sexual abuse. Her father is Ron Book, one of Florida’s top Lobbyists.

Miami’s former Assistant State Attorney, Jason Pizzo, was newly elected to the Senate in November. He was endorsed by the Florida Education Association. He self-funded more than $300,000 of his campaign. He has a Bachelor’s degree from New York University, a Master’s degree from Columbia University and a law degree from University of Miami. According to his campaign website, Pizzo is “committed to smart education reforms that put the emphasis back on student achievement and make sure our schools have the funding they need for our children to succeed.”

So, though Representative Sullivan seems to be the only homeschooled legislator, she is not the only one without a college degree. Senator Perry and Senate Ed Appropriations Chair Kelli Stargel also have high school diplomas. The committees are loaded with charter advocates and school choice privatizers. We hope these legislators will recognize their paramount duty “to make adequate provision for the education of all children residing within its borders” (Article IX, Florida Constitution) and focus some attention on the vast majority of Florida’s students who attend PUBLIC schools.

Of course, the “elephant in the room” is the rumored impending appointment of former House Speaker and public education wrecking ball, Richard Corcoran, as Commissioner of Education. Read about it here and here. On Tuesday, current Commissioner of Education, Pam Stewart announced her retirement, clearing the way for the Corcoran appointment.

Corcoran’s term as Speaker was devastating for public schools. He is proud of his reputation as a “disrupter.” He, also, has a reputation as a “bare-knuckled political brawler who uses words as weapons.” He called the teachers’ union “evil” for filing a lawsuit against vouchers. He coined the phrase “failure factories” to describe low scoring, low socioeconomic schools, and then created “Schools of Hope,” a plan to entice privately managed, corporate charter school chains to create networks across Florida. He lambasted school districts for building “Taj Mahal” schools, suggesting districts “spend more on construction than on  helping students in struggling schools.” (For the record, district schools are not allowed to spend capital funds in the classroom.)

Corcoran dropped out of University of Florida but eventually got a degree at Saint Leo, a Catholic University in Tampa. He went on to study law at Regent University, a Christian school in Virginia founded by televangelist Pat Robertson, where he met his wife, Anne. They have 6 kids, whom Anne homeschooled before founding  Classical Preparatory School, a charter school with a classic liberal arts curriculum. Anne Corcoran reportedly takes a $1 salary at her charter school. Since his election as Speaker, Anne has been able to expand her charter school and has sought to build similar charters around the state.

Corcoran’s goal has been to disrupt public education, or in his words “be transformative.” It should be noted that, in Speaker Corcoran’s House, Manny Diaz and Jennifer Sullivan did much of the heavy lifting needed to advance his education privatization agenda. Now it looks like his two henchmen will be chairing both chamber’s Education Committees, leaving the soon to be appointed Commissioner Corcoran to translate their legislation into policy. For public education advocates, the scenario is frightening.

It looks like this session may be a turning point for what is to come for our K-12 educational system. Will public school advocates, educators, Superintendents and school board members rise up to make sure there remains a place for true public education within the choice offerings?  Can our schools endure the storm that is on the horizon? We hope so. Batten the hatches.