Lawsuit challenges Ron DeSantis’ new anti-diversity law; New College of Florida trustee hopes lawsuit “will prevail”

Share
New College
New College of Florida in Sarasota. By Seán Kinane/WMNF News (Apr. 2023).

Listen:

Students, professors, and supporters of New College filed a lawsuit against the University System of Florida’s Board of Governors and New College Board of Trustees over a law that limits public college instruction. However, one Board of Trustees member welcomes the suit.

Governor Ron DeSantis appointed six conservative members to the Board of Trustees in January and the school has seen many conservative changes since then. Amy Reid is the director of Gender Studies and Faculty Representative on the Board. She says the timing was no mistake.

“They made that announcement on January 6th to signal both to those of us at New College and to the larger right-wing echo chamber that they intended to carry out an assault on the values of American democracy”

So when a group of alumni and supporters dedicated to “saving” New College from the right-wing takeover sued the school’s trustees as well as the University System of Florida’s Board of Governors and the state’s education commissioner over a new Florida law, Reid was pleased.

“Despite the fact that I’m a named defendant, I’m hoping that my colleagues will prevail.”

The law is Senate Bill 266. It limits what public colleges can teach about racism, sexism, and oppression. They’re asking a judge to block the state from enforcing the 2023 law and to declare that the measure is unconstitutional.

 

Leave a Reply

  • (will not be published)

XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

You may also like

Emissions testing in Florida ended at the turn of the century. One group wants it back

Listen: Florida is one of 21 states that don’t require...

USF Anthropology professor Tom Pluckhahn
USF researcher digs into the question of whether manatees are native to Florida

Manatees are such a part of Florida’s environment it’s easy...

Hurricane Milton Trop power trucks
Florida regulators approve about $12 per month increase for FPL customers due to hurricanes

Customers of FPL, Florida’s largest power company, will see a...

2024 hurricane season storm names
The 2024 hurricane season was one of the costliest on record

the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season was one of the costliest...

Ways to listen

WMNF is listener-supported. That means we don't advertise like a commercial station, and we're not part of a university.

Ways to support

WMNF volunteers have fun providing a variety of needed services to keep your community radio station alive and kickin'.

Follow us on Instagram

In the Groove
Player position: