State Representative Manny Diaz Jr., (R-Hialeah), chair of the Choice and Innovation Subcommittee of the Florida House of Representatives, is sponsoring a bill aimed that numerically ranks schools and allows Florida’s top schools the flexibility to hire experts in certain fields like history or science without prior certification.
According to Diaz, HB 875 is to reward the top schools by bringing the brightest minds in specific fields to the classrooms.
“We should continue to give parents and students choices within our public schools,” Diaz said in a prepared statement. “We should encourage innovation instead of stifling our principals and administrators.”
Another major component of the education bill would be the state’s Department of Education spending at least $1 million in liability insurance for instructional personnel.
The Department would also begin publishing on its website its numerical rankings for schools beginning with the 2016-2017 school year.