Writing in the Tampa Bay Times, journalist Jeff Solochek reports that the College Board released a letter last night denouncing the Florida State Department of Education. The College Board says it was naive in trusting the latter agency, which wanted to score political points.

Taken aback by Florida’s attacks against its new AP African American studies course, the College Board late Saturday denounced the state Department of Education, saying it used the course to advance a politically motivated agenda.

The organization’s letter, published at 8 p.m. Saturday, came just two days after it released another statement that did not take such a harsh tone as it pushed back against the department’s claims that portions of the course are “historically fictional.”

“There continue to be conversations and misinformation, and we felt the urgency to set the record straight and not wait another day to do so,” a College Board spokesperson…

The College Board released this letter last night. It seeks to demonstrate that it did not cave in to Florida’s demands. It does not explain why all of Florida’s targeted names and topics were deleted.

Our commitment to AP African American Studies, the scholars, and the field

COLLEGE BOARD COMMUNICATIONSFebruary 11, 2023

Our commitment to AP African American Studies is unwavering. This will be the most rigorous, cohesive immersion that high school students have ever had in this discipline. Many more students than ever before will go on to deepen their knowledge in African American Studies programs in college.

Teachers and students piloting this course are everywhere voicing their enthusiasm for the discoveries they are making. They are thriving in the openness and respect of the classroom environments they have built.

There is always debate about the content of a new AP course. That is good and healthy; these courses…

Linda Lyon, former president of the Arizona School Boards Association, writes in her blog “Restore Reason” about the newly elected State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne, who held the same office from 2003 to 2013.

He intends, she says, to stop “critical race theory” and “social-emotional learning.” He seems to think that “diversity, equity, and inclusion” are nothing more than left wing propganda. He’s a get-tough guy who will crack down on students and teachers.

She writes:

You’ve heard it said that an old dog can’t learn new tricks. AZ Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne is the living embodiment of this saying. His campaign gave us a preview that he was not going to change his ways. After all, he didn’t tout plans to improve our public schools (he was vying for the position overseeing “public” instruction after all), but rather, posted countless campaign signs shouting, “STOP CRITICAL…

“In the last 10 days I have read about 20 sophisticated articles analyzing the results of the 1968 elections. Most of these pieces of punditry contained the same two assumptions — which I believe are misleading, and perhaps paralyzing, illusions. One is that the election returns are proof of a sharp veering to the right by the electorate. And the other is that the future hope of liberal politics rests with the ‘new politics’ Democrats. I disagree with both these interpretations. First, George Wallace ran much weaker than most of us anticipated. He carried only five Southern states, for a total of 45 electoral votes. He failed to get the bit white working-class vote in the industrial backwaters of Gary, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Detroit. And he did not carry any of the border states such as Kentucky, Maryland, or Texas, that his supporters hoped he would. Second, most of the…

“… I’m a theater guy. In my field, in my business, when a character addresses the audience, there are two options: he or she is on the stage itself, in front of us, telling a story (see Our Town, Swimming to Cambodia), or the character is speaking to us from a specific place and time other than onstage and right now. The actual actor is always in the present, on the stage, but the character, more often than not, is somewhere else—some other location at some other moment—addressing us from there. Someone once excitedly told me about seeing a play by Irish playwright Conor McPherson, one in which a guy tells his long, crazy story directly to the audience and then, at the end, puts on a necktie. Suddenly, the audience knows he’s going out, or going to court, or wherever. The reveal is that he is not…

“The Beatles made several appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show, including three in February 1964 that were among their first appearances in front of an American audience. Their first appearance, on February 9, was seen by a then-record 73 million viewers and came to be regarded as a cultural watershed that launched American Beatlemania—as well as the wider British Invasion of American pop music—and inspired many young viewers to become rock musicians. The band also made another appearance during their 1965 U.S. tour. Ed Sullivan Show talent booker Jack Babb saw the Beatles twice in concert in the UK in 1963, after being invited by Peter Prichard, a London talent agent who was also friend of Beatles manager Brian Epstein. Babb was initially uninterested in booking the group for the show, as British musical acts at that time experienced little commercial success in the U.S…

“ZigZag was a British rock music magazine. It was started by Pete Frame and the first edition was published on 16 April 1969. The magazine was noted for its interviews, articles, innovative ‘rock family trees’ by Frame, and support for American songwriters such as Michael Nesmith, Mickey Newbury, Gene Clark, etc. It lasted in various forms through 1986. It was edited by Pete Frame for the first 29 issues, up to February 1973. Frame later said: ‘None of the English music papers wrote about the music I liked. They all concentrated on popular acts, but I was interested in the Underground scene. So I decided to start a magazine for people who liked the same kind of music I did. I called it Zigzag after the Captain Beefheart track Zigzag Wanderer and also the cigarette papers, which were used for rolling joints.’ Pete Frame’s…

Baptized at the Creek
by Shutta Crum

All us kids stood—wide-eyed. Cousin Billy
stuck his thumb in his mouth, as they laid Aunt Gertie backward
under the brown waters of the creek.

Right then and there, sacredness came floating ‘round us.
The holler got so warm and holy I could hardly breathe.
I reached out and squeezed Sissy’s hand.

Aunts and uncles, standing witness, shouted Hallelujah!
and raised their arms to heaven. Billy peed on a tree.
We giggled. Uncle Winn snagged him with his arm.
Grandpa prayed.
Praise the Lord!

When they helped Aunt Gertie up the bank of the creek
her clothes clung sopping over her rounder parts,
the way honey clings to a biscuit. I tried not to look.

We ate corn bread, fried chicken, green beans and ham hocks,
homemade rolls, canned peaches, and Grandma’s pies.
Billy wiggled, corralled between Uncle Winn and Grandpa.

Cousin Louann…

February 5^th was established in 2004 as California Western Monarch Day by the California state legislature, to celebrate these beautiful butterflies and their annual migration to spend winters on the central coast of California, and to highlight the rapid rate of their decline. Researchers estimate that a jaw-dropping 970 million monarchs have vanished just since 1990.

To read more about Monarchs, other butterflies, and moths click: