College Leaders Joining Forces to Fight Anti-DEI Legislation and Policies
“Don’t change anything until it is absolutely legally required”
The left is apparently willing to die on the DEI hill. Anyone surprised?
Inside Higher Ed reports:
College Leaders Galvanize to Fight the Anti-DEI ‘Chaos’
Chaos is the goal,” Mike Gavin, president of Delta College in Michigan, told a Zoom room full of higher ed professionals on a January afternoon. “These external forces are trying to cause chaos to distract us from our mission.”
By “chaos” he meant the onslaught of anti-DEI legislation sweeping the country—state laws requiring universities to scrub diversity statements from their hiring processes, identify DEI-related courses and programs for scrutiny, and cut personnel, centers and offices dedicated to supporting underrepresented student groups.
Over the course of an hour, Gavin and Stephanie Fujii, president of Arapahoe Community College in Colorado, took turns sharing practical bits of advice for college leaders and employees, should they find themselves in the legislative line of fire: what potential scenarios to prepare for, which offices should coordinate responses to anti-DEI legislation and how to communicate those responses to the campus community. Over and over again, they advised higher ed leaders: If there isn’t a federal or state law yet—or there’s wiggle room within the law—don’t overcomply.
“Don’t change anything until it is absolutely legally required,” Gavin told his colleagues.
More than 50 higher ed leaders and staff members took part in the training session by Education for All, a grassroots coalition of mostly community college administrators advising each other on how to fight legislative attacks on DEI. Gavin, who spearheaded the group, said the group has offered a series of trainings during the last six months or so, over Zoom and at conferences, to an estimated 1,300 people—with more to come.
What Gavin started two years ago as an informal community made up of a handful of concerned community college presidents has grown into a network of roughly 500 college administrators and higher ed association leaders, who not only conduct trainings but meet monthly on Zoom to hear from experts about the latest anti-DEI developments and talk about what they’re experiencing on their campuses.
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Comments
I see a college loosing federal funding and grants.
Probably one is all it will take because then the rest will just roll over belly up, because it really is all about the money.
I would not expect anything less from the scum that run universities.