MIAMI — Holding signs with phrases like “We only teach facts” and chanting “Hey DeSantis we’re no fools, we won’t let you run our schools,” at least 100 students, faculty and others marched around the main campus of Florida International University Thursday afternoon to protest Gov. Ron DeSantis’ education agenda.
In the past month, DeSantis has escalated his fight against the so-called “woke left” in higher education in Florida. He said he wants to defund and eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs on college campuses in the state. He required universities to submit detailed information on services they provide to transgender people seeking gender-affirming treatment. He also overhauled the leadership of New College of Florida, a small public liberal arts college in Sarasota, including appointing an interim president, Richard Corcoran, a former Florida House speaker who is being paid $699,000, nearly $400,000 more than his predecessor.
In response, students at FIU and the University of Florida, the University of Central Florida, the New College of Florida and other colleges and universities have mobilized, staging walkouts and protests. Some will also travel to the state’s capital, Tallahassee, when the legislative session starts on March 7.
The governor’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from the Herald.
At New College, DeSantis recently installed a controversial new governing board. Two of the six DeSantis appointees to the New College board are Christopher Rufo, who turned critical race theory into a conservative battle cry, and Matthew Spalding, a government professor at Hillsdale College, a small conservative Christian college in Michigan.
DeSantis said $15 million of his budget will go toward reorganizing New College and funding new faculty positions.
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Before and after their nearly 45-minute march around the FIU campus, the crowd gathered in front of the Graham Center, one of the busiest areas on campus. Inside the center, the FIU Board of Trustees met for a regular meeting.
Kaily LaChappelle, one of the protest organizers and the president of the FIU Pride Student Union — an umbrella organization that includes all LGBTQ-related clubs on campus and represents about 500 members — said he fears DeSantis will tamper with FIU’s leadership the way he did at New College. The protesters picked Thursday because of the board meeting.
“We wanted to make our movement visible,” he said. “We’re calling upon our board of trustees and all 12 public universities’ board of trustees to stand against DeSantis and to stand with the students, to stand for academic freedom, to stand for transgender rights, to stand for queer rights. They have a duty to our students. Not to mention you’re letting DeSantis win if you’re falling for his fear tactics.”
Dean Colson, chair of the FIU board, provided a 500-word emailed statement through a university spokeswoman that in part thanked “everyone for all their hard work during these interesting times.”
“I would like to say that FIU has been and will remain focused on becoming a top ranked public research institute. If we receive new directions from the Board of Governors we will respond just as we did when performance metrics were implemented or just as we did when we were directed to place a renewed emphasis on DEI a few years ago,” he said. “If we have made mistakes, we will fix them. If the priorities of the BOG have changed, we will react. But, I believe we have been and will continue to serve our very diverse community in a manner that reflects the very best of what a public higher education can offer.”
He also added: “Peaceful protests are part of the foundation of the wonderful democracy in which we live. It’s appropriate that these peaceful protests are taking place on a university campus — college campuses are designed to encourage the free exchange of ideas.”
In his statement, Colson said “FIU is not in the business of ‘indoctrinating’ its students.”
And although he admitted it could be “tricky at times,” he deemed it possible to “provide the protections certain leaders are worried about today without compromising the academic freedom that is foundation of our universities.”
He also said FIU does not provide sex reassignment treatment and did not disclose any patient health record while responding to the recent request from the governor.
Besiki Kutateladze, an associate professor of criminal justice at FIU, said he attended the march because he felt responsible for his students. With his husband, Kutateladze is raising three kids who attend Pinecrest Elementary. He also wanted to advocate for their learning at the K-12 level.
“I’m here to tell these kids that there are people behind them that share their views, that we do not demonize trans kids or Black history or immigrant students,” he said.
Kutateladze said the state will lose intellectuals who will move elsewhere, particularly those from minority communities because of DeSantis’ rhetoric.
He also worries the new policies will turn off students from attending public Florida universities.
One of those disenchanted students is Natalie Saladrigas, who’s getting her associate’s degree at Miami Dade College but plans to finish her undergraduate degree elsewhere, likely in Boston.
“As someone who’s interested in learning about systems of oppression and racism ... I don’t want to go to school here because I know a lot of my education is going to be whitewashed or it’s going to be taken away from me because of what’s going on in Florida,” she said. “I don’t want to study here because of that.”
Saladrigas, 20, founded Queer Collective, the first LGBTQ club at the MDC Padron campus and attended the FIU protest.
She said she wants to become a professional activist. She said she wants to gain knowledge out of state and then return to Florida to advocate for all students.
Still, other students remain more optimistic.
Natalia Sanchez, who’s getting a master’s in higher education administration at FIU, said she wants to teach after graduation and that the governor’s policies have been “disheartening.”
Sanchez, the daughter of immigrants from El Salvador and a first-generation college student, received her criminal justice bachelor’s at FIU and she loved it. If the DEI funding disappears, she believes FIU will no longer embrace students from varying socioeconomic and racial backgrounds as much.
Sanchez, 21, protested Thursday because she wants to protect that experience for future students like her.
“And seeing this protest, seeing people stand up, I have hope that higher education won’t get destroyed,” she said.
