MIAMI – Miami-Dade County teachers and parents are speaking out against proposed changes to education.
"The message we're trying to send today is we need to veto HB 7069 and this disastrous budget," Antonio White, vice president of United Teachers of Dade, said.
"There are so many unanswered questions about what happens to schools like mine, what happens to buildings like mine. That conversation was never had," Miami Carol City Senior High School teacher Alexandria Martin said.
Teachers and parents protested Tuesday morning outside Miami Senior High School, where the State Board of Education was discussing the proposed budget.
Miami-Dade County Public Schools superintendent Alberto Carvalho said the state budget increases funding to public schools, but it's not as big an increase as in previous years.
"I know that budgets are a reflection of values. We budget what we value. We defund what we don't value," he said.
Carvalho joined protesters in asking Gov. Rick Scott to veto the budget and bill, which Carvalho said would fund charter schools by taking away money from traditional public schools.
"Unfortunately, our legislators have gone to the system of for-profit charter schools to replace a public system that compensates all people," White said.
The governor will decide whether to approve the budget and the House bill. So far, he hasn't said which way he's leaning.