Florida 5th Grade Teacher: Parental Rights ‘Are Gone When Your Child Is in the Public School System’

A Hernando County, FL parent is upset about a Winding Waters K-8 school fifth-grade teacher showing her students a pro-LGBTQ Disney movie.

The parent, Shannon Rodriguez, protested fifth-grade teacher Jenna Barbee’s decision during a local school board meeting.

“It is not a teacher’s job to impose their beliefs upon a child, religious, sexual orientation, gender identity, any of the above,” Rodriguez said. “But allowing movies such as this assist teachers in opening a door — and please hear me — they assist teachers in opening a door for conversations that have no place in our classrooms.”

Barbee begged to differ. During an appearance on “CNN This Morning,” the fifth-grade teacher argued parents were stripped of their rights when the child entered a public school system.

“We had played that for the viewers in the introduction, but I just want to give you a chance to respond,” host Poppy Harlow said.

“Yes, so, that’s — what she’s missing and what these parents are missing is, they’re not in the school system. That just shows me that she’s ignorant and has not come and volunteered at all because our — these conversations, these doors, they’re open. These students have one-to-one devices. The amount of things that they’re able to pull up that we have to shut down, they – they — these conversations, these doors that she’s talking about, that’s telling you I’m stripping her rights as a parent, those rights are gone when your child is in the public school system because there are students talking about these things. It’s where they get 90 percent of their socialization for the day. And we can’t shut down every conversation every child has.”

Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor