African American class drops topics DeSantis hated, but creator denies ‘political pressure’

A revised framework for a controversial Advanced Placement African American studies course released Wednesday no longer contains topics such as “Black queer studies” and suggested readings about critical race theory that Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration blasted last month.

The new framework, an outline for what will be taught, also does not include references to the Black Lives Matter movement, reparations or authors whose writings about communism and incarceration, among other subjects, upset Florida leaders.

But the College Board, which runs the 38-course AP program, said only college professors with expertise in the subject were consulted to develop the final framework for the new class.

Robert Patterson, a professor of African American studies at Georgetown University, was a co-chair for the committee that helped develop the course. In a statement released by the College Board, he praised the class and said revisions are part of all AP courses and were made “independently from political pressure.”

The revised framework was completed in December, the agency said in its statement.

“No states or districts have seen the official framework that is released, much less provided feedback on it,” the statement said. “This course has been shaped only by the input of experts and long-standing AP principles and practices.”

The College Board said the new course, to debut nationwide in the 2024-25 school year, gives a complete picture of African American history.

“This course is an unflinching encounter with the facts and evidence of African American history and culture,” said David Coleman, CEO of the College Board, in the statement. “No one is excluded from this course: the Black artists and inventors whose achievements have come to light; the Black women and men, including gay Americans, who played pivotal roles in the Civil Rights movements; and people of faith from all backgrounds who contributed to the antislavery and Civil Rights causes. Everyone is seen.”

Florida leaders in mid-January told the College Board that the initial framework violated Florida law by teaching critical race theory, a once arcane legal theory that views racism as embedded in American institutions. Eliminating it has become a conservative cause across the nation and a priority of DeSantis, who got it banned from Florida’s public schools two years ago and reinforced that with passage of the “Stop woke” act last year.

Critics viewed it as an effort to whitewash history and ignore the stories of non-white Americans and the decision to reject the AP course as proof of their worries.

State education leaders, however, said the course, as first proposed, was without “educational value” because its suggested reading list included works by authors such as Angela Davis who were communists or favored abolishing prisons and it delved into topics like “Black queer studies.”

That latter, in particular, upset DeSantis who said, “When you try to use Black history to shoehorn in queer theory, you are clearly trying to use that for political purposes.”

Florida leaders said the class would not be offered in Florida next year unless it was revamped. A spokesman for the governor said the Florida Department of Education was reviewing the new framework and would comment when it had gone through the document.

Florida’s decision to reject the course prompted protests, threats of a lawsuit and criticism, including some from professors who helped devise it. Those professors said the course put a lens on subjects often absent in the high school curriculum and would offer valuable lessons to Florida students.

A group of 200 African American studies professors posted an online letter to DeSantis on Tuesday criticizing his decision to keep the course from Florida’s public high schools. “This is censorship and a frontal attack on academic freedom,” the letter read.

On Wednesday, the National Black Justice Coalition, a Black LGBTQ civil rights group, accused the College Board of capitulating to Florida’s governor.

“To wake up on the first day of Black History Month to news of white men in positions of privilege horse trading essential and inextricably linked parts of Black History, which is American history, is infuriating,” said the group’s director, David Johns, in an emailed statement.

“The College Board’s decision to capitulate to Governor Ron DeSantis’ extremist anti-Black censorship demands, stripping the AP African American studies course of key content about contemporary Black history, is an insult to the lived experiences of millions of Black Americans throughout our country today,” he added.

The coalition said it was upset that topics related to LGBTQ people were removed along with readings by scholars who had written about them.

Most of the topics DeSantis and his staff at the Florida Department of Education objected to were in the final and fourth unit of the course, which is titled “movements and debates.”

The topics of “Black queer studies,” “intersectionality and activism” and reparations — all of which raised state leaders’ ire — were absent from that unit in the final framework, though topics on “diversity within the Black community” and “identity, culture and connection” were added.

The revised framework also deleted all suggested readings, some of which upset Florida leaders, allowing teachers to decide what textbooks and secondary sources to assign as they devise daily lesson plans. That was done, the College Board said, so that the only required items would be primary sources, from maps to artwork to essays, poems and speeches. That is consistent with how other AP courses operate, it said.

The new framework also includes a student research project to be done at the end of the course. Some of the suggested research topics are ones Florida objected to, such as reparation debates, “queer life” in Black communities and “intersectionality and the dimensions of the Black experiences,” though dozens of other topics are suggested, too, and students do not have to pick from the suggested list.

A spokesperson for the College Board did not immediately respond to questions asking for additional information on why some topics were altered

Though suggested readings about critical race theory included in the initial framework are absent from the revised framework, some think Florida could argue that the course’s overall focus on racism, with topics on housing discrimination, for example, would still violate its laws.

The state is selecting new social studies textbooks this year and reminded publishers in a memo that instructional materials may not include critical race theory, or CRT, or any of its “applied principles,” such as the concept of “social justice,” which it defined in part as “equality of treatment under the law is not a sufficient condition to achieve justice.”

The ban against CRT said also students should not feel “discomfort” because of their own race or sex.

AP courses are meant to mimic introductory college classes and students who take and pass the corresponding AP exam can earn college credit. Florida has been a long-time supporter of the program and led the nation in AP participation in 2021. Last year, Florida students took more than 363,000 AP exams.

But upset with the initial framework for AP African American studies, state leaders made the Florida State University Schools’ high school stop teaching the course mid-year. The FSU school was one of 60 high schools nationwide piloting the course this school year.

The same happened at a Miami-Dade County high school, the Miami Herald reported.