Glenn Youngkin Reviewing DEI Content in Courses at Two Virginia Universities
“The universities say they have complied with the unusual requests.”
Republicans have upped their game on this but they could still go further.
Inside Higher Ed reports:
Virginia Officials Scrutinize Two Universities’ DEI Course Syllabi
Republican politicians have targeted diversity, equity and inclusion in state after state. They’ve passed laws to limit, defund or outright ban related programs. They’ve demanded information on universities’ DEI expenses and their numbers of DEI positions.
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, a Republican who won office in 2021 after campaigning against the alleged teaching of critical race theory in K-12 schools, is diving into the details. His education secretary’s office has requested to review syllabi from upcoming diversity-themed courses at two public universities: George Mason, which has been planning a broad “Just Societies” mandate, and Virginia Commonwealth University, which has been planning a new “Racial Literacy” requirement. The universities say they have complied with the unusual requests.
Kristin Reed, assistant professor in the focused inquiry department at VCU and co-founder of VCU’s chapter of the United Campus Workers union, called Youngkin’s request to scrutinize just these courses a “targeted attack” on teaching about race and racism. “I have seen how these culture wars play out in K-12 education—they start with these symbolic gestures and they lead to book banning and censorship and the firing of teachers,” Reed said.
Faculty members at both institutions have been planning for years to launch the requirements for new undergraduates, and were hoping to do so this fall. Now, some worry that Youngkin’s requests may be a prelude to violations of academic freedom and shared governance that will quash the new criteria. Youngkin’s first executive order as governor was to root out critical race theory and other “inherently divisive concepts” from public K-12 schools.
At George Mason, a few Board of Visitors members have pushed back on the requirement. The implementation of a racial literary class requirement at VCU was already in question.
Melissa Broeckelman-Post, a communication professor and the George Mason Faculty Senate president, was more measured than Reed, telling Inside Higher Ed “a lot of folks get nervous when there’s a lot of scrutiny placed on syllabi.” She noted that “the board has broad oversight,” but said “the details of the curriculum really should be left to faculty.”
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Comments
Both VCU and GMU need a good ass whooping in this area.
DEI/CRT are such a fraud.
smh
This is why winning elections is essential and irreplaceable.
The leftists in academia keep wanting to expand the definition of “academic freedom”. It is really about freedom in research, for people who have attained certification as researchers, essentially a PhD. It can extend to freedom to teach one’s own crazy research ideas; that’s part of why one goes to a good university, to hear the thinking of the faculty.
It does not include the freedom to grade students and not have grades changed on appeal, nor does it extend to setting formal curricular gen-ed requirements. Those are not related to the freedom of disciplinary thought, but about power. Such overreach needs to be smashed, hopefully with consequences for those who promoted it. Otherwise their will to power will continue unabated.