Wire Services
The Florida Senate is scheduled Thursday to consider a proposal aimed at notifying parents about their right to “opt out” of sex-education instruction for their children, after the Rules Committee approved the measure an 11-3 vote Tuesday.
Under the proposal (SB 410), school districts would be required to notify parents of their right to make written requests to exempt students from sex-education lessons. Notices would have to be posted on districts’ websites, and the districts would be required to publish any sex-education curriculums.
School boards would have to approve sex-education instruction annually under the bill.
“This bill aspires to achieve greater transparency, and I think that is important as a parent. You want to be able to know what your children are seeing in the classroom,” bill sponsor Ana Maria Rodriguez, a Doral Republican, said Tuesday.
The House last week made changes that aligned a similar bill (HB 545) with the Senate proposal. Before the changes, the bill would have required parents to be notified “at least 10 instructional days” before sex-ed lessons and would have required written parental consent.
The Senate bill is scheduled to be heard during a Thursday floor session, while the full House is slated Thursday to consider the House version.
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Republished with permission from the News Service of Florida
