NAPLES, Fla. – Gov. Ron DeSantis doubled down on his opposition to a proposed AP Black history course Monday, telling reporters during an appearance in Naples that the Florida Legislature would be reevaluating its relationship with the College Board.
“The College Board was the one that put in a Black studies course, queer theory in, not us,” he said. “They did that. They were the ones that put in intersectionality, they put in other types of Neo-Marxism into the proposed syllabus. And remember, this is a proposed course -- so our Department of Education looked at that and said, ‘In Florida, we do education not indoctrination,’ and so, that runs afoul of our standards.”
The governor also questioned whether the state would continue working with the College Board in the future.
“So this College Board -- nobody elected them to anything. They’re just kind of there and they’re providing service,” he said. “And so, you can either utilize those services or not. And so, they’ve provided these AP courses for a long time, but you know, there’s probably some other vendors who may be able to do that job as good or maybe even a lot better, so I’ve already talked with (House Speaker) Paul (Renner), and I think the Legislature is going to look to reevaluate kind of how Florida is doing that and, of course, our universities can or can’t accept College Board courses for credit.”
The governor’s latest comments come after he vowed to ban the course in Florida.
The rejection has stirred new political debate over how schools teach about race.
The official curriculum for the course, released earlier this month by the College Board, downplays some components that had drawn criticism from DeSantis and other conservatives. Topics including Black Lives Matter, slavery reparations and queer life are not part of the exam. Instead, they are included only on a sample list states and school systems can choose from for student projects.
The College Board, which oversees AP exams, said revisions to the course were substantially complete before DeSantis shared his objections.
“The fact of the matter is that this landmark course has been shaped over years by the most eminent scholars in the field, not political influence,” the organization said in a written statement.
The board is also now saying they should have immediately denounced what they called the Florida Department of Education’s “slander” that the course “lacks educational value.”
The board said while it made mistakes in the rollout of the course, the dialogue over the issue has moved from a healthy debate to misinformation.
The revised curriculum will guide the course’s expansion to hundreds of additional high schools in the next academic year. College Board officials said developers consulted with professors from more than 200 colleges, including several historically Black institutions, and took input from teachers piloting the class.