My first run-in with education in Florida was when my son came home one day from middle school and and told me that his science teacher told the class that the AIDS "bacteria" was spread by dumping infected diapers in local landfills which then contaminate the ground water, exposing everyone to the disease. "AIDS isn't caused by bacteria, is it Dad?"
My wife and I requested a consult with the teacher. We found her very nervous, so much so that she requested a witness (a social studies teacher) be present. When she was stuck for a truthful answer during our questioning, the "witness" interrupted several times with "Now Ms. X is a good Christian woman."
We gave up in frustration and appealed to the principal, who was also very uncomfortable. "Um, um, Ms. X has taught for 30 years." When we made it clear this wasn't going away, he assured us Ms. X would be retiring at the end of the year, and also agreed to move our son to a different class.
High school was better, only because our son took mostly AP classes, but one didn't have to look very far to see that many of the non-AP teachers weren't much better than middle school. Even so, I ended up "home-schooling" my son and several of his classmates in biology, chemistry, and physics a few evenings a week, just so they could do well in the ACT and SAT. My son, now very happy at UF, thanks me every time we talk.
Much of Florida's bad rep comes from north Florida, especially the northwestern panhandle, where educated kids leave and never return, and the rest become Bubba, just like daddy.
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