Florida's would-be strongman Gov. Ron "Bootsie" DeSantis apparently didn't like the College Board's broadside against his attacks on the Board's AP African American Studies framework (they rightly saw DeSantis and his Department of "Education" as making "false and politically motivated" charges designed to further his political agenda). Well, Bootsie has his shovel, and he's digging a deeper hole:
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) warned Tuesday that he may withdraw state support for AP programs, intensifying his ongoing conflict with the College Board, which oversees all AP classes, including an African American studies course the DeSantis administration says leans left and lacks “educational value.” Earlier this month, the College Board said it was revising the course to eliminate lessons on Black Lives Matter and the reparations movement.
After the College Board said Florida’s criticism of its AP African American studies course amounted to “slander,” DeSantis suggested his state might drop AP classes from its schools. Instead, he said, schools could expand alternatives, such as the International Baccalaureate and Cambridge Assessment programs, which, like AP classes, permit students to earn college credit by passing an exam.
It remains unclear what the governor can do to nix AP classes, although he may be able to halt Florida’s practice of paying AP exam fees ($97 per test) for public school students. If DeSantis follows through, hundreds of thousands of students will be affected: Over 199,000 Florida students took AP classes in the 2020-2021 school year, The Washington Post has reported, and roughly 366,000 AP tests were administered statewide at the end of that year.
Parents across Florida are naturally reacting in shock:
“It terrifies me that DeSantis is threatening to eliminate AP classes after seeing how much it benefited my daughter’s education,” [Clearwater resident Colleen] Hamilton said. “It is truly horrifying to be a resident of Florida right now.” Hamilton is “heavily weighing” whether to encourage her 2-year-old granddaughter’s father to move his family out of Florida before the girl reaches school age, she said.
Stephana Ferrell, a 40-year-old mother in Orange County, is having similar thoughts of escape. Ferrell, a former photographer who put her business on pause to help lead Florida Freedom to Read, a nonprofit organization that fights school book challenges and bans in the state, has two children enrolled in public elementary school. Ferrell has long hoped her children would take AP classes.
“My number one concern as a parent right now is that my kids will be cut off from additional information about the world,” she said. “Will they be able to learn beyond what our state is going to allow them to know?” Ferrell said she and her husband are waiting to see how DeSantis fares in the 2024 presidential election before making a final decision on moving from Florida, where their family lives.
This petulant, racist autocrat is foolishly willing to put thousands of Florida students at a disadvantage in applying for college admission to further his own careeer, perhaps figuring that those courses/ tests are mostly taken by the children of pointy- headed elitists, so score one for owning the libs!
But what's going on here is much more serious and destructive: in his quest to be the next Trumpist cult leader, Bootsie is pandering to the Republican base by focusing on (racist dog whistle alert) "anti-wokeism," which has been described as "weaponized personal grievances masquerading as a genuine social concern," and which Bootsie got enacted in Florida as the "Stop W.O.K.E. Act." Specifically in the educational sphere, it represents a wholesale racist whitewashing American history to downplay or eliminate discussions of systemic racism, social justice and contributions of people of color and other marginalized groups to our Nation's tapestry. Bootsie's targeting of AP African American Studies (and gutting the liberal New College of Florida) are key elements of his war on academic freedom, but are just a part of his broader fascistic culture war that includes attacks on the LGBTQ community ("Don't Say Gay" law and related attack on Disney), the media, and lifesaving science.
Sadly, Floridians handily re-elected "Meatball Ron" (the Malignant Loser's latest sobriquet for Bootsie), whose ambitious agenda may someday be afflicting your family and their future. We should all be working fervently to make sure that never happens.
BONUS: More on what "freedom" means to Bootsie.
(Photo: our favorite pic of Bootsie)
