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Faculty members in Florida are worried that their departments and academic freedom are at risk after lawmakers in the state proposed banning majors and minors in “Critical Race Theory, Gender Studies, or Intersectionality, or any derivative major or minor of these belief systems.”
Faculty members in Florida are worried that their departments and academic freedom are at risk after lawmakers in the state proposed banning majors and minors in “Critical Race Theory, Gender Studies, or Intersectionality, or any derivative major or minor of these belief systems.”
House Bill 999, a 23-page piece of legislation before Florida’s state legislature, follows the lead of Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, in targeting what’s taught in higher education and how academe operates. If passed, the bill would prohibit public colleges from funding any projects that “espouse diversity, equity, and inclusion or Critical Race Theory rhetoric.” It would also give boards of trustees unprecedented power over faculty hiring, tenure review, and rewriting university mission statements; ban general-education courses that teach “identity politics” or define American history “as contrary to the creation of a new nation based on universal principles stated in the Declaration of Independence”; and ban academic programs in gender studies, critical race theory, and intersectionality.
Although there aren’t many majors or minors that go by those names, many academic disciplines discuss those topics in the classroom. Faculty members across disciplines are worried their programs could be targeted as well.
Irene Mulvey, president of the American Association of University Professors, said HB 999 is a violation of academic freedom, which she says requires faculty to have control over curriculums, regulated through peer review. “The profession has been self-regulating in this way for decades and has resulted in a system of higher education that’s the envy of the world.”
Mulvey said academic freedom is important to uphold democracy and that HB 999 presents a threat to both.
“It is state-mandated censorship,” Mulvey said. “Under HB 999, the state is dictating what can be taught and what can be learned and what must not be taught. This is positively incompatible with democracy. It’s a complete violation of academic freedom. People should recognize how dangerous this is.”