Amid statewide efforts to overhaul general education courses, New College of Florida is making sweeping changes to its core curriculum. Faculty members say these efforts by conservative ideologues will limit student access to information and undermine NCF’s founding mission as Florida’s only public liberal arts college.

The changes follow recent legislation that has mobilized universities across the state. dropping a large number of general education coursesIt mainly deals with hot button political and social issues. Despite objections from faculty, public universities dropped dozens of courses, including Anthropology of Race and Ethnicity, Introduction to LGBTQ+ Studies, and Sociology of Gender, to comply with SB 266, which takes effect in mid-2023. It bans core courses that “contain a curriculum that distorts significant historical events or teaches identity politics,” as well as courses that “are based on theories that systemic racism, sexism, oppression, and privilege are inherent and created by U.S. institutions.” perpetuating social, political and economic inequalities.”

Critics argue that New College, where curriculum revisions unrelated to SB 266 are already underway, has gone further than the law requires. They blame the conservative board of trustees appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis in early 2023. Reimagining NCF in the image of Hillsdale CollegeA well-known private Christian institution in Michigan. One of his first actions was: hiring former GOP lawmaker Richard Corcoran. as president. Now critics say NCF leaders have drastically overhauled the core curriculum, limiting course options with little input from faculty and behind closed doors from outside influences.

A Sudden Redesign

Three years ago, in the fall of 2021, NCF “Chart Your Course” core curriculumis defined as “signature program” unique to New College, which provides students with significant flexibility in choosing which general education courses to take.

“Many students have a negative attitude towards genes; they just want these classes out of the way,” said a current New College professor who spoke on condition of anonymity Inside Higher Education. “But from our perspective, I think students probably find the overall classes more interesting and are more motivated because they can choose from such a broad menu.”

Three years later, NCF is redesigning its core curriculum.

Wide space has disappeared, replaced by narrow route options. Courses including Introduction to Sociology, Introduction to Cultural Anthropology, Religion in America, a Latin American film studies course, and a section on feminist writings from Africa appear to no longer count toward general education credits. In some cases, students have no choice; The only option to fulfill NCF’s humanities requirements is now a half-term course. Odyssey. (When NCF beta-tested the course for inclusion in the core curriculum last fall, The launch was very sudden He said officials were having a hard time finding guest lecturers to teach it.)

Faculty members worry that a lack of options limits student agency and that the new curriculum makes NCF like other members of the State University System, traditionally an outlier given its small size and quaint nature.

Some claim that both MPs and NCF’s newly installed executives share the blame.

“At New College, not only have they followed the Legislature’s restrictions, they have gone even further in limiting the options students have, which is the exact opposite of what was before and contrary to the mission of the school,” the anonymous person wrote. said the lecturer.

Another NCF professor, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that although faculty were “involved in the development” of the new core curriculum, “the ever-changing demands of the administration made the process chaotic and many programs were relocated.” goalposts, starting over and good offers being abandoned. The source added that faculty signed off on the core curriculum framework presented last spring, but administrators later changed it without their input, dropping a required writing course and replacing it with another elective. They worry that these elective course options will be limited to “courses that fit a certain ideological mold.”

Amy Reid, a faculty member who served on NCF’s board of directors at the time, objected to the change at the June meeting. He said this represented a “significant change” and argued that there was “no justification for unilateral transitions” once faculty signed off on the curriculum framework.

Despite Reid’s objections, the board of trustees approved the proposal.

New College did not respond to multiple requests for comment Inside Higher Education. But various administrators and trustees have weighed in publicly on key curriculum revisions, offering insights into the philosophical underpinnings of the changes.

In August, NCF trustee Chris Rufo to write City MagazineHe called the ongoing curriculum overhaul the “hard work of reform” aimed at reinventing New College as a classical liberal arts college, as the governor has requested. Rufo argued: “New College has the opportunity to create a curriculum on par with our private sector counterparts like Hillsdale College and to show that public universities do not have to bow to leftist ideological captures. “With enough political will, they can govern themselves according to completely different principles.”

My fellow trustee, Mark Bauerlein, to write federalist Last year, he argued that university curricula had gone off course nationally and emphasized “shallow diversity” in the development of core values.

“This is a student health issue. Liberalism and progressivism have targeted institutions and ideals (nation, church, community, family, tradition, western civilization, the American way) that once gave young people a meaningful foreground for their lives,” Bauerlein wrote.

He concluded: “A fixed, consistent, superior core is one way to provide them with what they have lost. We need this not just at New College but in every liberal arts school in America.”

Dark Origins

Accordingly New University documentsThe new core curriculum is built around two concepts: “logos” and “techne”. logos It is defined as “the interconnectedness of mind, language, logic, reflection, communication, order and meaning”. boat “It emphasizes the importance of applied knowledge: creating, experiencing, analysing, trying and solving.” Materials for the renewed curriculum There are artworks showing Socrates wearing a virtual reality headset, Benjamin Franklin flying a drone, and Thurgood Marshall talking to a robot.

NCF framed the new curriculum as a combination of reasoned conversation and applied knowledge that “will provide students with a transformative and coherent educational experience,” according to the plan’s draft proposal. “While these courses inherently create community among students, Interim President Corcoran firmly believes that New College must provide an exceptional academic experience that connects all New College students, both within their groups and over the years, and propels them successfully into their lives. After college.”

Although not publicly disclosed, some concepts in NCF’s new core curriculum appear to have emerged from conversations between Corcoran and former Harvard University lecturer David Kane.

Public records obtained by Inside Higher Education It shows that Kane reached out to Corcoran and other officials in April 2023, seeking a job running NCF’s data science program and proposing a major curriculum overhaul rooted in classical education. In an email to Corcoran, Kane introduced himself as someone who taught data science at Harvard University before it was “canceled for the usual ridiculous reasons.” racist blog posts he allegedly wrote a piece that led Harvard to let his contract expire in 2020 and Simmons University to cancel class In 2022.

Emails he sent to Corcoran show the two met and had phone calls last April.

“Chart Your Course has failed,” Kane said in a message, saying it was time for a new pedagogical approach with an emphasis on classical education and great books.

“A major flaw of NCF (and many other colleges) is their failure to prepare students for the modern world. They graduate without the ability or ability to do anything worthwhile that someone else is willing to pay for. Are the students to blame? NO! NCF is wrong,” Kane wrote in his proposal. “It is our responsibility to ensure that every student graduates with the ability to do/do something of value, as measured by the wages their fellow citizens deliver.”

Kane also argued that “no lectures should be held” at New College; Classes should instead focus on discussion, with instructors teaching multiple sections to keep class sizes small.

Some details of Kane’s offer later emerged in NCF documents; for example, the emphasis on the phrase “techne,” which appears more than two dozen times in his message to Corcoran. But a close examination of Kane’s offer (and his offer) External writings about NCF) shows that although administrators clearly adopted some of his concepts, he fell short of the sweeping changes that New College proposed. Instead, Corcoran and his colleagues seem to have built largely on his ideas.

(Contacting Inside Higher EducationKane declined to discuss the exchange with Corcoran.)

Next to DeSantis at a press conference last May, Corcoran told local news outlets that a new core curriculum will not mean the end of individualized programs at the university. But faculty members argue that’s exactly what’s happening: Student options have dwindled as administrators prepare to launch NCF’s new core curriculum next fall.

“For a small college like New College with a distinctive program and a lot of flexibility and options, now offering exactly the same limited curriculum, but even more limited than anywhere else in the Florida public university and college field — how are we different?” the first anonymous faculty member said. “At this point we’ve gotten smaller, we’ve got worse food, moldy dormitories and the same classes as everywhere else, even fewer options. “It limits access to information and makes it extremely homogeneous, which will make it difficult for universities to distinguish themselves from others.”