The College Board said Thursday that it won’t make changes to its Advanced Placement psychology course and in particular the material concerning gender and sexual orientation, putting it on a collision course with Florida governor Ron DeSantis.
In April, the governor’s administration expanded the state’s restrictions on instruction in gender or sexual orientation. The Parental Rights in Education Act originally applied only to students between kindergarten and grade three, but the Florida Department of Education expanded the rule for students all the way to twelfth grade. Free-speech advocates have raised concerns about such limits, as well as the limits Florida has placed on course content at colleges and universities, because of their potential chilling effect on speech.
The College Board responded to the Florida Department of Education: “[College Board] will not modify our courses to accommodate restrictions on teaching essential, college-level topics. Doing so would break the fundamental promise of AP: colleges wouldn’t broadly accept that course for credit and that course wouldn’t prepare students for careers in the discipline.”
The educational nonprofit also said it regretted mistakes it made when it rolled out its AP African-American Studies course.
DeSantis’s administration rejected the African-American Studies course earlier this year, saying the pilot curriculum had an inappropriate political agenda. The College Board made cuts to the more controversial aspects of the course in response. The fracas, among other things, led the NAACP to take the unusual step of issuing a travel advisory against the state of Florida. “This is a pure stunt,” said DeSantis in response to the effort. He also mentioned the travel advisory during his initial 2024 campaign appearances.
The College Board made the point that participation in AP classes is a choice. “Families can review AP course content and make informed decisions about whether they want their students to participate,” the organization said.
Cassie Palelis, press secretary for the Florida Department of Education, told Politico on Thursday that the College Board is responsible for ensuring that its submitted materials comply with Florida law.
Florida is increasingly moving to its own high-level courses and college-entrance exams. The state is giving students the option to use the Classic Learning Test, or CLT, as an alternative to the SAT and ACT. It is unknown how colleges and universities outside the state would react to applications from those who eschew the testing gold standard.