The Holocaust, a principal and a teachable moment

Palm Beach County school administrators bungled the William Latson matter almost from the start, making it almost inevitable that an administrative law judge would order him to be reinstated in a different position.

Worse, they apparently still give principals too much discretion on howto teach what Florida law requires: that every student hear how hatred killed some 6 million Jews during the Holocaust, along with 5 million other targeted minorities, and made refugees of many millions more.

The same sort of people who did that in Europe are now strutting about our country, emboldened by a president who said there are “fine people” among them.

That is why the Latson debacle matters so much.

For those new to the story, Latson is the former principal of Spanish River High School in Boca Raton who made it appear in correspondence with a student’s mother two years ago that hewas either a Holocaust denier or sympathetic to people who are.

Explaining that he “advertised” to 10th grade parents about the school’s annual Holocaust assembly, he said hewas thinking of those “who do not want their children to participate andwe have to allow them the ability to decide.”

Whenthe parent replied that “the Holocaust is a factual, historical event. It is not a right or a belief,” Latson went out of his way to make the situation worse.

“Not everyone believes the Holocaust happened,” hewrote, “butwe are a public school and not all of our parents have the same beliefs… I can’t say the Holocaust is a factual, historical event because I am not in a position to do so as a school district employee.”

Thatwas absurd. The Holocaust is indisputable, documented beyond doubt as exhaustively as any chapter in history.

Those who deny it do so to whitewash the atrocities of Nazi Germany and propagate to this day and in this country the Nazis’ lethal doctrines. Holocaust denial is a staple of malignant anti-Semitism.

Moreover, it wasn’t Latson’s place to say whether itwas factual. Itwas his duty to followthe lawenacted by the Florida Legislature, which requires every middle and high school to have a curriculum on the subject. There are similar requirements for other essentials such as African American history. It is left, properly so, to state and local regulations to decide how to fulfill them.

In Palm Beach County, itwas— and still is— the prerogative of principals to decide howto teach about the Holocaust. Whatever else comes out of the Latson mess, that much should change.

Even as he ordered Latson reinstated, the judge, Robert S. Cohen, remarked that “an assembly is not required, but if it is part of the curriculum, the assembly must be mandatory.”

Appealing his dismissal, Latson explained to Cohen that the Holocaust was taught in ninth and 10th grade English classes at Spanish River, aswell as in an elective course and at the annual assembly.

It’s time for some outside experts to evaluate the sufficiency of that, especially the issue of relegating it to English classes instead of the study of history. The school board should invite a performance audit by the Anti-Defamation League, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, or some other similarly expert organization.

According to Cohen’s findings, Latson’s supervisors reacted to the parent’s complaint by counseling him to be “more circumspect” in writing e-mails to parents. Theywere apparently unaware that he might be allowing some students to skip the assembly— an option not allowed by district or state regulations.

The district did nothing else for more than a year until the Palm Beach Post disclosed the Latson correspondence. Beset by the bad publicity, administrators then asked him to take a voluntary reassignment and made it mandatory after he did not reply.

Latson made matters worse, the judge found, with a message to Spanish River faculty and staff that appeared to blame the parent. At a meeting with superiors, he again “compared the Holocaust to a belief.” All that led to the decision to fire him— an action taken more to quiet an intense public controversy than to reinforce Holocaust education in the schools.

Cohen found that Latson had in fact seen to teaching the curriculum, isn’t a Holocaust denier himself, had an “otherwise stellar career,” and that dismiss alwas “too severe in light of 26 years of service.”

The judge also observed that the board had deviated fromits policy of applying “progressive discipline, and had failed to prove “misconduct in office, incompetence or gross insubordination.”

His transfer, on the other hand, was justified because of how poorly he had expressed himself to the parent and the faculty.

Administrators still have not said what Latson will be doing to earn his salary, last reported at $107,000 a year, other than that it will not be in a campus setting.

The board’s 4-3 decision to accept the judge’s order and reinstate Latson was the prudent option despite its unpopularity. As its outside counsel explained, it is extremely difficult to persuade a court to overturn an administrative law judge’s finding. The case already has cost the board more than $100,000 in legal fees as well as the back pay, now approximately $152,000.

For his part, Latson still owes the community an apology. One of his own supporters on the board called him out for that, citing his “reckless and offensive statement.”

The Florida lawthat he applied so casually explains in its text why education on the Holocaust is so vital.

“The systematic, planned annihilation of European Jews by Nazi Germany” was a “watershed event in the history of humanity, to be taught in a manner that leads to an investigation of human behavior, an understanding of the ramifications of prejudice, racism, and stereotyping, and an examination of what it means to be a responsible and respectful person, for the purpose of encouraging tolerance of diversity in a pluralistic society and for nurturing democratic values and institutions.”

That matters urgently, now more than ever.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there has been a 55% increase in the number of white nationalist hate groups since 2017. Scarcely a day goes by without one or more new incidents of overt acts, including vandalism featuring Nazi swastikas and other anti-Semitic graffiti.

That is why the Palm Beach schools must double down on Holocaust education.

The Latson debacle is a teachable moment that must not go to waste.