Public school transparency leads to greater trust between parents and schools and greater accountability where needed. That’s why we support the recently launched Parent Plus Portal from the Florida Department of Education as an important step towards accountability through transparency.
The Parent Plus Portal gives schools a standardized way to open their doors—digitally—so parents can see what their children are learning. Parents can observe the textbooks their children use and access their content. They also can observe the library materials in their kids’ schools. The tool allows parents to filter the results by school, grade level, subject, and more.According to the portal’s website, it provides parents with a “simple way to navigate and view instructional materials, library media, and educational resources used in their student’s classrooms.” By placing this information directly in parents’ hands, the portal turns transparency into accountability. Parents see what is being taught, and schools know they are answerable to families.
The portal enhances transparency, which builds trust. When schools operate in the light, they earn the confidence of parents, taxpayers and policymakers. When they don’t, suspicion festers, tensions flare, and students ultimately suffer.
Last year, the Institute for Governance and Civics at Florida State University polled over 1,200 likely Florida voters. Just 56% said they trust K-12 district schools “in general.” What’s more, only 42% said they trust K-12 schools to provide students “with an education that is free of political bias.” These answers came from parents on the left and the right of the political spectrum.
But among the K-12 distrusters, 70% responded that giving parents more information about what is being taught in their kids’ classes would make them trust schools more. Transparency can lead parents to trust their schools more, and accountability ensures that trust is well placed.
Transparency also leads to greater parental control. It is parents who have the final say in directing the upbringing of their children, and the portal can help with that.
During online classes in the throes of COVID, Ryan’s son’s ninth grade World History class spent days on “how to be a good activist.” Nowhere in the discussion was the propriety of “activism” itself addressed. Nor was there any real discussion of relevant history. Ryan and his wife pulled their son from the class and sought a different path that was right for them.
Erika’s journey into education reform came in a similar way, as a mom concerned about what her children were learning. In 2013, after repeated frustrations and disagreements with the public school, she and her husband decided to withdraw their son and enroll him in a private school. Her personal experience sparked her advocacy for greater parental involvement and choice and ultimately led to her election to the Collier County School Board, where she saw firsthand how limited transparency created unnecessary conflict and mistrust between schools and families.
It should not have required a pandemic, online courses, and hours of frustration to make these changes. Parents should not have to file public records requests — or worse, pay document fees — just to find out what their children are learning. (Nor, for that matter, should teachers have to fear that transparency will diminish their professional expertise.) The opposite is true: openness strengthens the bond between schools and the communities they serve.
Transparency isn’t a left-right issue. It’s a good governance issue. And governance depends on accountability, which can only exist when schools are transparent with families. Whether you are a parent worried about ideological influence in schools, a parent who wants to know if your child has access to age-appropriate, high-quality materials, or a parent who wants to read along and quiz your kids on their schoolwork, transparency helps parents raise their kids.
Right now, the Parent Plus Portal contains information only from the Franklin County school district. Other districts should follow. The portal will succeed only if local school boards adopt it and ensure it is fully populated with accurate, accessible information. This means ensuring that curriculum materials, supplemental resources, and library holdings are searchable and up-to-date.
Florida has given us a useful tool. Now, it is up to local leaders — and engaged parents — to ensure it is implemented.
Erika Donalds is the founder and CEO of the Education Freedom Foundation. Ryan Owens is the director of the Institute for Governance and Civics at Florida State University and is a professor of political science.
