"It took a half century to build New College into a sanctuary of independent thought and less than a year to destroy it. In 2023 the beloved Florida liberal arts school became state governor Ron DeSantis's latest target in his so-called war on woke. DeSantis decimated the school's trustee board and installed a cabal of rightwing cronies, aiming to transform it into a conservative institution modeled after Michigan's evangelical Hillsdale College."
"Library shelves were stripped, with books from Black and Indigenous authors and the shuttered gender studies department tossed into dumpsters. Frat boys arrived in droves and the campus was transformed into a meathead's playground where queer couples stopped holding hands for fear of homophobic slurs."
"After ousting former board president Patricia Okker in January 2023, DeSantis installed a gruesome line-up of new trustees who aimed to strip the school of woke ideology and abolished DEI programs and critical race theory. The new board included characters like openly racist former Florida house speaker Richard Corcoran and Christopher Rufo, a conservative activist who fueled Trump's attack on diversity."
New College of Florida, a 700-student liberal arts school, underwent radical transformation in 2023 under Governor Ron DeSantis's political initiative. The administration replaced the trustee board with conservative appointees, including openly racist figures and activists opposed to diversity initiatives. The school eliminated gender studies programs, removed books by Black and Indigenous authors, abolished DEI programs, and dismantled critical race theory courses. Physical campus changes included destroying the community garden to build a baseball stadium. These actions created a hostile environment where LGBTQ+ students feared harassment. The documentary First They Came For My College chronicles how students mobilized to resist the institutional overhaul and fight for the school's original mission of independent thought.
#higher-education-politics #conservative-institutional-takeover #dei-and-academic-freedom #student-activism #political-polarization-in-education
Read at www.theguardian.com
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