Valencia College Stops Diversity Education to Comply with Stop Woke Law

ORLANDO, Florida. An elective diversity curriculum for teachers at a public college in central Florida has been canceled so administrators can ensure it complies with a new state law known as the Stop the Awakening Act.

Valencia College President Kathleen Plinske wrote in an email to faculty earlier this week that the school needed time to review teacher development courses to ensure they were in line with the law championed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.

The law prohibits teaching or business practices that claim that members of one ethnic group are inherently racist and should feel guilty about past actions committed by others. It also bans the notion that a person’s status as privileged or oppressed is necessarily determined by their race or gender, or that discrimination is “acceptable” to achieve diversity.

The school’s decision only covers the spring semester and courses may be offered later after review, Plinske said in an email.

Federal judge in Tallahassee last November temporarily banned against the law, and the measure has been challenged in two other cases.

While promoting the law, which applies to a range of training and instruction, DeSantis called critical racial theory a “pernicious” ideology. Opponents say DeSantis does not have an accurate idea of ​​what critical racial theory is and argue that his motives are to cover up an accurate account of black history.