Republican Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida put the kibosh on an Advanced Placement high school class on African American history and culture. The College Board introduced the course last year with a pilot program and plan to make it available to all schools across the country next year. According to DeSantis's spokesperson Bryan Griffin, the curriculum ""leaves large, ambiguous gaps that can be filled with additional ideological material, which we will not allow."
From CNN:
In a January 12 letter to the College Board, the nonprofit organization that oversees AP coursework, the Florida Department of Education's Office of Articulation said the course is "inexplicably contrary to Florida law and significantly lacks educational value."
"In the future, should College Board be willing to come back to the table with lawful, historically accurate content, FDOE will always be willing to reopen the discussion," the letter stated[…]
The rejection of an Advanced Placement African American Studies course follows efforts by DeSantis to overhaul Florida's educational curriculum to limit teaching about critical race theory. In 2021, the state enacted a law that banned teaching the concept, which explores the history of systemic racism in the United States and its continued impacts. The law also banned material from The 1619 Project, a Pulitzer Prize-winning project by The New York Times to reframe American history around the arrival of slave ships on American shores. Last year, DeSantis also signed a bill restricting how schools can talk about race with students.
