The College Board will revise its Advanced Placement African American Studies course for high school students after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, rejected it as “indoctrination,” according to a Tuesday afternoon announcement.
“Thanks to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ principled stand for education over identity politics, the College Board will be revising the course for the entire nation,” DeSantis’ press secretary, Bryan Griffin, said in a Tuesday tweet. “The Florida Department of Education will review the changes for compliance once resubmitted.”
The College Board said it will release the revised framework on Feb. 1, replacing the initial pilot rejected by the Florida Board of Education.
“Before a new AP course is made broadly available, it is piloted in a small number of high schools to gather feedback from high schools and colleges,” the College Board said in a statement. “The official course framework incorporates this feedback and defines what students will encounter on the AP Exam for college credit and placement. We are grateful for the contributions of experts, teachers, and students and look forward to sharing the framework broadly.”
Alex Lanfranconi, a Florida Department of Education spokesperson, told Florida’s Voice the department is glad the College Board recognized the “problematic” nature of the course.
“AP courses are standardized nationwide, and as a result of Florida’s strong stance against identity politics and indoctrination, students across the country will consequentially have access to an historically accurate, unbiased course,” Lanfranconi said.
DeSantis rejected the course on Jan. 19, calling it a “vehicle for a political agenda.” He defended the call on Monday due to the course’s inclusion of lessons on black queer theory and the prison abolition movement, among other objectionable topics, which the governor said fail to meet Florida standards.
“As submitted, the course is a vehicle for a political agenda and leaves large, ambiguous gaps that can be filled with additional ideological material, which we will not allow,” Griffin said.
After the initial rejection, the College Board told The Associated Press the course was still under development and subject to change. The board said the course would be tested in 60 schools before its release nationwide, a process during which it said, “Frameworks often change significantly.”
“We proudly require the teaching of African American history,” Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. said in a Friday tweet. “We do not accept woke indoctrination masquerading as education.”
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