The College Board will revise its Advanced Placement African American Studies course after proponents of critical race theory accused the organization of watering down its curriculum for Gov. Ron DeSantis (R., Fla.).
The College Board, a billion-dollar nonprofit that administers the SAT and advanced high school courses, said in a Monday statement that its "scholars and experts have decided they will make changes to the latest course framework" to "ensure the course best reflects" the "dynamic discipline." The change comes three months after the group stripped its curriculum of controversial critical race theory content after DeSantis announced he would ban a draft version of the course that covered subjects including the "queer experience" and "Black feminism."
DeSantis in January said the draft curriculum was "inexplicably contrary to Florida law and significantly lacks educational value." The College Board walked back the controversial topics the next month and released a stripped down version.
Now, however, the College Board is again revising the course, this time after critical race theorists and leftwing activists complained about the controversial subjects being cut from the curriculum. Several academics launched petitions calling for revisions of the advanced high school course. The College Board's Monday decision comes after an activist think tank called the African American Policy Forum planned a nationwide protest partly in response to the "anti-woke" revisions of the course.
"We demand that the College Board restore critical concepts, scholarship, and frameworks to the African American Studies course, and to resist pending demands from other states to bend to their 'anti-woke' orthodoxy," the group's website calling for the May 3 protest says.
The College Board will determine changes "over the next few months," it says on its website. Black studies scholars want the curriculum to cover topics including reparations, Black Lives Matter, and intersectionality, the New York Times reported.