Overview
- The law takes effect July 1, 2026, and requires Florida public elementary students to be taught cursive between grades 3 and 5 and to demonstrate mastery before advancing to middle school.
- Proficiency is defined as the ability to write upper- and lowercase letters in cursive, form full words and sentences legibly with proper spacing and alignment, and read cursive by the end of fifth grade.
- Florida school districts are finalizing lesson plans and assessment approaches for rollout in the upcoming school year, but specific tests, timelines and teacher training programs remain under development.
- Supporters and some forensic examiners argue cursive signatures contain more individual variation and complexity, which they say makes them harder to forge and could reduce signature-based identity theft; state officials also cite private schools as a model for access.
- Cursive had declined in many public curricula over recent years, so the new law seeks to equalize access to the skill and will require districts to add materials and training, which could shift elementary instructional time and produce uneven implementation across districts.