Harvard Faculty and Cambridge Students Speak Out Against Ban Of AP African American Studies

The banning of an Advanced Placement course on the Florida College Board for African American Studies by Gov. Ron DeSantis, who claimed the course would “indoctrinate” education, was condemned by faculty at Harvard, Cambridge Ridge and the affiliated Latin School with the university council.

The course — developed by a panel that included Harvard professors Henry Louis “Skip” Gates Jr. and Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham — was launched as a pilot program in 60 high schools for the 2022-2023 school year. 

This fall, more than 500 high schools will participate in the program before it becomes widely available in fall 2024.

DeSantis, who graduated from Harvard Law School in 2005, last month announced a state ban on the AP course because he called it a contradiction to Florida’s “Stop WOKE Act,” which bans schools from teaching critical race theory — interdisciplinary Examination of institutional racism.

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The College Board released post-experimental changes to the course on February 1, which include a departure from critical race theory. 

However, an internal document distributed to professors by the college board denies changing course to “beg” governors or the state of Florida, and describes the changes, which included recommendations from hundreds of professors.

Harvard Kennedy School professor Khalil Gibran Muhammad called DeSantis’ rejection of the course “a direct attack on faculty autonomy.”

“Whenever there is an explicit or implicit challenge to an AP course that more or less makes up the curriculum of every student taking a class in every class across the country, every college and university gets a passing student credit claim,” he said to Mohammed. 

Muhammad is one of 200 faculty members of African American studies in higher education in the United States who wrote an open letter on Jan. 31 condemning the DeSantis ban. 

The letter had more than 700 signatures as of Monday evening. The letter states, “The claim that AP curricula in African-American studies have ‘lack of educational value’ is a claim supported by white supremacist ideology because it demeans Black history, culture, and contributions.”

Mira L. Levinson, a Harvard Graduate School of Education professor who opposed DeSantis Block, said it was “important to explore so many different dimensions of African-American culture, life and history.”

“It’s important to recognize that this is a proposed course in African American studies, not just an African American history class,” Levinson said.

Levinson also cited research showing the positive benefits of attending ethnic studies courses for some students.