JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Commissioner of Education Manny Diaz, Jr. were in Jacksonville Monday with a new proposal for Florida's teachers.
DeSantis wants to increase teacher pay, and had a few choice words for teachers unions.
The big part is this $1 billion the governor wants to use to increase teacher pay, but he spent much of the time talking about what he wants to require from teachers' unions.
The governor's office says right now the average starting pay for teachers is over $48,000. If this $1 billion proposal goes through, that will mean DeSantis has put $3 billion toward teacher pay since 2020.
The other part of DeSantis's proposal takes aim at teachers unions.
Much of what DeSantis talked about is his goals with creating requirements for or putting prohibitions on teachers' unions.
DeSantis wants to require teachers unions to provide financial reports to the states annually, to submit an audited financial statement certified by an independent accountant, and he wants to allow the Department of Education to initiate investigations into fraud, waste, or abuse.
The governor also answered questions for the first time about why the course was canceled.
"In Florida our education standards do not prevent, but require teaching Black history...that’s part of our core curriculum. This (AP African American studies) was a separate course for advanced placement credit," he said. He called the proposed course "indoctrination, not education."