The House PreK-12 Budget Subcommittee has unanimously advanced a measure that seeks to put an Automated External Defibrillator (AED) in every school in Florida.

Clermont Rep. Taylor Yarkosky and Hialeah Rep. Alex Rizo presented the bill (HB 1607). Yarkosky detailed why both Republican lawmakers want the devices to be present on school campuses: because of the growing frequency of cardiac arrests that are taking place in schools.

“Sudden cardiac arrest is the No. 1 killer on school campuses in Florida,” Yarkosky said, before detailing some nationwide statistics.

“It equates to about four of our youth dying every day, which is about 1,380 schoolchildren every year. The current survival rate is about 9%. It could be as high as 90% because the majority of these deaths are preventable by quick responses and awareness. If these AEDs are deployed within three minutes of the event happening, 90% of the time, a life is saved, and they go on to live a normal life.”

Yarkosky noted that the risk of cardiac arrest affects all students and pointed out that the leading cause of death in student athletes is also cardiac arrest.

“This one I think is extremely important that we pay attention to here today, and I say it’s quite literally a ticking time bomb out there” Yarkosky said.

Yarkosky said that 1 in every 300 youth, or approximately 15,000 to 16,000 children in Florida, currently has an undiagnosed heart condition that will lead to an event more than likely in the future.

“I use this analogy all the time. If we had four students dying every day due to fires in schools, what do you think we would be doing as a body? We would shut down this state, we would be in Special Session, and we would be figuring out how we’re going to never have a fire in a school again,” Yarkosky said.

“Thankfully, I go back to 1958, and I can’t find a death from a fire. We put fire extinguishers, we have sprinkler systems, we have security with alarms, we have everything to prevent that.”

The bill would put an AED in every school in Florida, including charter schools. School staff would be required to participate in CPR and AED training, and a pulse saving plan will be created. The State Board of Education would also be given the ability to adopt and implement rules.

Yarkosky further thanked Fort Pierce Republican Rep. Dana Trabulsy for her leadership through the bill’s passage.

“Folks, I say that the time has come now. We’ve been working on this for a few years,” Yarkosky said. “I believe the stars and moons have aligned and with your vote here today, I wholeheartedly see us getting this done this year and the Governor signing this bill.”

Tiffany McCaskill Henderson from the American Heart Association supported the bill and said it would be able to save more lives than just students, but anyone who has a cardiac event while on school campus.

“The American Heart Association is in full support,” McCaskill Henderson said. “With this bill, I know we’re talking about the school environment, of course students first, also I’d like you to think about faculty, staff, all of the people that are in and out of schools, parents, grandparents — this will benefit them as well should they have a cardiac emergency on school campus.”

In closing, Rizo thanked the committee.

“This is going to save lives, not just children but adults,” Rizo said. “Every single person that steps foot onto a school campus in Florida will benefit from this.”

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The House PreK-12 Budget Subcommittee advanced a measure that would align the Florida schools grading system with the grading system used for Florida’s school students.

Tampa Republican Rep. Susan Valdés said the bill (HB 1483) would bring transparency to the Florida school system by allowing parents to know how the school they choose for their child truly performs.

“The purpose of this bill is to provide truth and transparency to our parents, students, and teachers on how well each school is preparing its students.” Valdés said. “Florida’s current grading system is an A through F system, and this was established to provide a universally recognized way of summarizing a students and schools academic performance, to motivate schools to improve strident achievement.”

Valdés clarified that the grading system in current use for students would not change.

“So, we all know that the school grading system, how we grade our kids in school is the grades A through F, meaning an A would be 90% to 100%, and this is not what we’re doing with comparing school grades to the way that we’re grading our kids,” Valdés said. “We need to make that clear, the way we grade our students will not change at all.”

However, Valdés added that the way that Florida grades it’s schools, is far below what people are all familiar with.

“So, for instance, if you’re in an elementary school in Florida, the bar for reaching an A grade, is set at 62%, not 90%.” Valdés said. “The bar for a C is at 41%, not 70%, and the bar for an F is 31%, not 59%. So, if you’re in middle school in Florida, the bar for an A is set at 64%, not at 90%, the bar for a C is at 44%, not a 70%, and the bar for an F is at 33%, not at 59%.”

Valdés said the bill would implement the change over the course of a ten-year period, and the changes would not begin until the 2026-27 school year.

“So, what does all this mean is that eventually over a ten-year period of time, we’re proposing that the Florida school grades align to the scale that we are most commonly used to having our kids graded on,” Valdés said. “The details of the transition are as follows: for the school year 2025-26, the school grades will not change in scale, what it will do is give the opportunity for districts to really assess and make sure that they have all the supports in line needed to help the students.”

Valdés noted the new grading scale would take effect during the 26-27 school year and will go up by one point over the next eight years, incrementally, to catch up with the way that students are graded.

Valdés explained that the bill also expands support for students with substantial deficiencies in reading and/or mathematics, by capturing more students in the need of support and expanding the provisions of interventions into voluntary pre-Kindergarten programs through grade eight, to cast a larger net of those supports for kids.

“The bill also requires that the New World Reading initiative develop a competitive grant, to provide classroom’s libraries that will include books encompassing diverse subjects and genres for each grade level from kindergarten through fifth grade,” Valdés said.

Tallahassee Democratic Rep. Allison Tant asked why the rating scale is how it is right now from the Department of Education (DOE). In response, Valdés said it was set years ago when school grading began and had not been addressed since around 2012.

Tant then asked how the bill will affect certain students who are living below the poverty line and if resources would be available to them to help them succeed.

“As you know, I represent a school that’s in turn around now, or has been, just came out over in Jefferson County,” Tant said. “I understand that we need to do something about this, but how do you accommodate those students that are in my district who have two incarcerated parents or raised by a great-grandmother or grandmother who may not be able to read herself, living in poverty.”

“Like, how are we making sure that in this grading system, we’re also bringing those kids that aren’t similarly resourced to some of their peers, don’t have anybody to reading to them at home, are hungry, maybe come to school with health issues, how are we addressing that?” Tant asked.

Valdés said the bill doesn’t change any of the support systems currently available to such students, and added could uncover more support.

“Really and truly this bill doesn’t change any of those supports that these families will receive,” Valdés said. “On the contrary, I believe what this bill will do, is really uncover a lot of the other supports that these families would need, by being transparent which with the actuality of that school.”

Valdés said that data from the DOE shows that 80% of students who score below a three by third grade, will never catch up.

“That’s scary. That’s scary and that should be something that should really give us a wakeup call,” Valdés said.

Greenacres Republican Anne Gerwig asked how they would go back and face demoralized schools who are eventually going to be judged on their fallen grade.

Valdés said that there are a lot of students currently at A grade schools who are not meeting third grade requirements and are at risk of permanently falling behind their peers.

“I believe in our school districts, I believe in these educators’ ability, they’re our superheroes, they really are, and when you’re thinking about there are … off the top of my head, 260 schools that are graded an A, who less than 50% of their students, are meeting the benchmark of being three and above. And they’re an A school,” Valdés said. “So that means that there’s some students that we are not capturing, that we’re still not wrapping our arms around them with their needs in order for them to prosper.”

Jacksonville Democratic Rep. Kimberly Daniels asked if the bill could go in a different direction if the transition shows it could be causing problems with schools.

Valdés said there would be more supports in place, but she would be happy to come back in future sessions to tweak things if needed.

During the bill’s debate, Tant said she had concerns around the different needs of different school districts and how they will continue to be served.

“Here’s the concerns I have, I have one school district in turnaround, I have another school district that’s coming out of turnaround and the effort that it has taken them has been monumental,” Tant said. “The grading scale in both those counties, and I want the grades to be reflective, but I will tell you that the needs in those school districts they’re vastly different, than the needs in Leon County for example.”

The bill will make its next stop at the House Education & Employment Committee.

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Less than three years after he won his seat on the 13-member board, Kevin Marino Cabrera is leaving the Miami-Dade Commission to serve as President Donald Trump’s chief liaison to Panama.

In a Monday letter to county Clerk Juan Fernandez-Barquin, Cabrera said he is resigning “immediately” to take the U.S. Ambassador to Panama post to which he was confirmed last week.

The power to choose his replacement falls to the Miami-Dade Commission, since the vacancy came by resignation.

Cabrera, 34, called serving on the Miami-Dade Commission “the honor of a lifetime” and thanked his colleagues on the dais, county employees and members of his District 6 team for making his tenure at County Hall productive.

“As I transition into this role, I carry with me the values that guided my services in Miami-Dade: a commitment to accessibility, accountability, and delivering results,” he wrote.

“As Ambassador, I will work to ensure that our foreign policy advances American interests and makes our nation stronger, safer, and more prosperous. Though my role is changing, Miami-Dade County will always be home.”

A first-generation Cuban American and the husband of state Rep. Demi Busatta, Cabrera won his seat on the Miami-Dade Commission by a landslide in November 2022 after receiving a rare endorsement for local office from Trump.

He served as Florida State Director for Trump during the 2020 election cycle and performed similar Prior to his elected work, Cabrera was a lobbyist and political operative whose employers included former Gov. Jeb Bush, ex-Congressman Carlos Curbelo, Florida Supreme Court Justice John Couriel, the LIBRE Initiative and Mercury.

He was elected as a Republican State Committeeman last year. His first elected post was as a Miami-Dade Zoning Board member.

On the technically nonpartisan County Commission, Cabrera pushed for policies to address traffic congestion, curb speeding, counteract reckless boating, streamline county permitting processes and renovate Miami International Airport, among other things.

He also successfully sponsored a resolution late last year to rename a street after Trump, who announced Cabrera’s nomination on his Truth Social platform by saying, “Few understand Latin American politics as well as Kevin.”

During his confirmation hearing March 25, Cabrera fielded questions from both sides of the political aisle on how he views his potential role.

Asked about Trump’s calls for the U.S. to reclaim control of the Panama Canal for national security purposes, Cabrera said his job would be to “serve at the pleasure of the President” and reiterated Trump’s assertion that “all the options are on the table.”

“Part of ‘all the options’ includes diplomacy,” he said, adding, “President Trump is our Commander in Chief, and I stand behind him and his policies.”

He stressed that as an Ambassador, he would endeavor to fulfill Trump’s foreign policy mandate to make the U.S. “stronger, safer and more prosperous” while doing his best to maintain the Panama Canal’s neutrality.

But there are concerns. The Chinese Communist Party has exercised increased influence on the region and Panama, which Cabrera noted was both the first Central American country to enter and leave China’s massive Belt and Road infrastructure initiative.

China’s tendrils are likely still embedded there, Cabrera said.

“You’ve seen it in cities like Colón, with the cybersecurity grants (China gave) for cameras in the area. You don’t know where that cloud information might be stored, who has access to it, and some of the reports were they have cranes that have been given to them by the Chinese government as well,” he said.

Cabrera’s confirmation came on a 51-45 vote along party lines April 9.  Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat who serves as the Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, joined her Republican colleagues in voting for him.

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