{"id":28820,"date":"2025-09-04T17:37:41","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T21:37:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=28820"},"modified":"2025-09-04T17:37:41","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T21:37:41","slug":"florida-mom-calls-out-school-after-son-given-dictator-award-says-district-targets-conservatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2025\/09\/florida-mom-calls-out-school-after-son-given-dictator-award-says-district-targets-conservatives","title":{"rendered":"Florida Mom Calls Out School After Son Given \u201cDictator\u201d Award, Says District Targets Conservatives"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_28823\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-28823\" style=\"width: 1200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/09\/Florida-Mom_credit-The-Florida-Channel-Screengrab.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-28823\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2025\/09\/Florida-Mom_credit-The-Florida-Channel-Screengrab.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"900\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-28823\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Florida Channel \/ Screengrab<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>A Florida mom is speaking out after she says her son was humiliated in the classroom by a teacher who gave him a \u201cmost likely to become a dictator\u201d award. She believes the incident is part of a larger pattern of bias against conservative families in her school district.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat motivated me to go to the state Department of Education is that I&#8217;ve had numerous run-ins with this school district,\u201d Florida mom Crystal Marull told <em>Fox News Digital<\/em> in an interview about her experience with Alachua County Public Schools in north central Florida.<\/p>\n<p>Marull raised the issue during a recent State Board of Education meeting, sharing personal stories of how she feels her children have been treated unfairly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy son, six years old, was prohibited from sitting next to his friend on the school bus because a parent objected to my perspectives on book challenges,\u201d Marull said, pointing back to an incident in fall 2023.<\/p>\n<p>She also described a troubling experience for her older son in May 2023.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy older son&#8217;s history teacher allowed students to label him a Naziphile simply for his interest in history and participation in ROTC,\u201d Marull said. \u201cShe later nominated my son as the \u2018most likely to become a dictator\u2019 and had his classmates vote on it. And try to force him to the front of the class to receive the certificate, which he rightly refused, all because of his conservative values and our perspectives.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While her teenage son brushed it off, the incident still left a mark.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHis feelings were hurt, he found it very inappropriate,\u201d Marull said. \u201cBut you know, he&#8217;s a typical teenage boy. He&#8217;s going to try to laugh it off and not show if it really does hurt him more deeply or not. He kind of let it roll. I was far more concerned because I believe it spoke to a larger problem within that classroom. It spoke to the problem that it appeared that this teacher was not equipped to be teaching history as she didn&#8217;t seem to appreciate history.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Gainesville High School history teacher Lauren Watts, who is at the center of the controversy, was placed on leave last week while the district investigated.<\/p>\n<p>Marull said she brought these experiences to light because she was \u201ctrying to point to a pattern of abusive behaviors of the school district toward conservative families.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Marull, who works as the coordinator for the online Spanish program at the University of Florida, has also been outspoken about sexually explicit books in school libraries. She said, \u201cOne of the texts that had been found in the library graphically depicted a teenage boy sexually violating a younger boy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Other parents have also raised concerns. Florida parent Jeremy Clepper told <em>Fox News Digital<\/em> that Sarah Rockwell, chair of Alachua County Public Schools, \u201cneeds to resign because of her comment \u2018good, one less MAGA in the world,\u2019 saying she wants all MAGAs dead,\u201d referring to Hulk Hogan&#8217;s death last month.<\/p>\n<p>Marull said she had tried to get answers directly but found little response. \u201cI had complained to the teacher, to the principal and to the school board and no one from the principal or the school board ever followed up on the issue,\u201d she said. \u201cSo it did happen two years ago, that was in May of &#8217;23. And the reason I brought it up at the meeting is I was trying to point to a pattern of abusive behaviors of the school district towards conservative families.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In a statement to <em>Fox News Digital<\/em>, Alachua County Public Schools confirmed that the matter is being looked into. \u201cThe district is investigating the incident shared by Dr. Marull during the August 20 State Board of Education meeting,\u201d the district said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe employee involved has been placed on administrative leave while the investigation is underway. In the meantime, any information about the incident is confidential under Florida Statute 231.291.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Florida mom is speaking out after she says her son was humiliated in the classroom by a teacher who gave him a \u201cmost likely to become a dictator\u201d award. She believes the incident is part of a larger pattern of bias against conservative families in her school district. \u201cWhat motivated me to go to&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":462,"featured_media":28823,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Florida Mom Calls Out School After Son Given \u201cDictator\u201d Award, Says District Targets Conservatives<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Florida mom says her son was given a \u201cdictator\u201d award in class, calling out bias against conservative families in the school district.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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