In this video a Spanish teacher in Florida was placed on leave and eventually resigned from the district because she handed students a survey that asked about their race, gender, sexual orientation, and disabilities entitled “How much privilege do you have?” The video features one parent of a student in the class and her negative reaction to the form. Students were not required to hand the forms in.
Topics: Awareness, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, privacy
Personal Take: I respect some of the parent’s concerns, but not all of them. The argument for student privacy can be made, but the forms were not required to be handed in, so the teacher and other students would not necessarily be aware of each others’ choices. As far as this taking place in a Spanish class, I tend to agree with the parent in terms of it being irrelevant, although the context of the form is unclear. Perhaps they were studying Spanish literature / film / culture and these topics appeared? I also do not like the aggressive and combative nature of the title of the assignment. Receiving a message that implies that students who select any options that is not normative do not have privileges, combined with potential harassment and bullying they face at school and possibly home, is probably not the best idea. I do not respect the parent’s view on these topics being talked about a home however. The reason behind this can actually be seen in the video itself. When the reporter asks the parent if her daughter knew the terms of the form (which appears irrelevant because there is writing next to the terms with the definitions, so the teacher did define them) the parent says “No,” but then continues to say “We’ve had the talk…but it should be talked about at home.” This is not a good idea, because if her daughter does not know any of the terms and was not aware of them, the “talk” given at home was not adequate (or, more likely, non-existent). This also brings up the question: If not at school, then where? Not all students can talk to parents or guardians about these topics.