Courses at Florida’s 12 public universities and colleges will be flagged for review if they wade into any topics that touch on the Middle East, namely Israel and Palestine.
This edict by the Florida Board of Governors is raising concern around the state with some saying this is yet another example of intellectual meddling, which they say is demoralizing and problematic.
Before the fall terms begin, faculty must submit their instructional syllabi so they can be entered into a database. Keyword searches will flag a course that uses the words “Israel, Israeli, Palestine, Palestinian, Middle East, Zionism, Zionist, Judaism, Jewish, or Jews” when describing the coursework.
A faculty committee will then review textbooks and other material for "antisemitic material and or anti-Israeli bias."
In an email to university and college presidents clarifying the edict, Chancellor Ray Rodrigues makes no mention of anti-Muslimism or anti-Palestinian sentiment.
“[There is] little concern for existing anti-Palestinian sentiment. This creates a very real chilling affect for Muslim students and faculty,” said Florida Gulf Coast University Professor of Philosophy Kevin Aho in an email to WGCU.
Aho chairs FGCU’s Communication and Philosophy Department. He informed faculty Wednesday saying this was “Disheartening to those who engage in social, historical and moral dimensions of Israel/Palestine conflict in class.”
Lyn Millner is one of those faculty members. She teaches journalism — where students are required to have an understanding of current events. The Israeli/Palestine conflict has dominated the news since more than 1,100 Jews were killed by Hamas on Oct. 7. The Israeli ground and air assault in response has killed more than 39,000 Palestinians, an average of 250 a day, which is higher than any other major 21st Century conflict.
“There are concerns. One concern is, how will antisemitism or anti-Israeli bias be defined or assessed," Millner said. "So as we've seen, bias can be sometimes obvious. It can also be tricky, so often opposing sides reading a factual article claim bias when the facts don't agree with their beliefs.”
Millner anticipates disagreements because the topic can be very emotional.
“Don't get me wrong, antisemitism is real," she said. "There is no question that we all need to fight antisemitism, along with making sure that all students of any religion, race, sexuality, etc., feel included and safe in our classrooms.
“So I think my colleagues and I recognize that we have a big responsibility. We need to choose our words carefully. We need to limit harm to the extent that we can. But this feels strange to many of us, and some people are claiming infringement on academic freedom because of these gray areas.”
An FGCU official said the university's leadership team is reviewing the data request from the State University System of Florida.
One of those the people making such a claim that academic freedom as well as First Amendment rights could be trampled on is Wilfredo Ruiz. He’s the outreach director for CAIR Florida, which stands for Council on American-Islamic Relations.
“What worries us the most is the state daring to step into the classrooms and condition what the academic freedom that our universities have long cherished for generations,” Ruiz said.
CAIR filed a complaint against the chancellor last year when he, through Gov. Ron DeSantis, ordered pro-Palestinian groups on college campuses be disbanded. The case was thrown out out of court this year after the state admitted it never followed through with the edict.
“So that is why this goes beyond a Muslim thing or an Islamic thing. This is really a call for all Floridians to be worried about the academic freedom that have guaranteed the academic excellence of Florida University for generations that it appears that DeSantis doesn't care about throwing that down the toilet in a blink of an eye,” Ruiz said.
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