HIGHER EDUCATION

Will a small, quirky Florida college become ‘DeSantis U’?

The governor appointed six trustees to New College of Florida, rattling many on campus

By Jack Stripling
January 23, 2023 at 6:00 a.m. EST

Randy Fine, a Republican state representative, thought New College of Florida was a travesty — a bastion of liberalism and a money-suck for taxpayers. At the LGBTQ-friendly campus, which some have dubbed “Barefoot U,” bookish seminars are popular, classes are given pass-fail and fraternity parties don’t exist. When students couldn’t settle on a mascot, they embraced a mathematical symbol instead: a pair of empty braces denoting the “null set.” There’s no football team for the 660 students to root for anyway.

Fine, like many conservatives, wanted New College gone. So in 2020, the lawmaker from Melbourne Beach, Fla., introduced a bill that would have merged the Sarasota school with a larger state university. But his Tallahassee colleagues weren’t on board, and the measure died in the legislature.

Then, earlier this month, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) appointed six new members to the school’s board of trustees, including some outspoken conservatives. At the “genius” of this plan, Fine, a Harvard graduate, could only marvel. ... “The institution as it exists will be effectively shut down and be rebuilt as ‘DeSantis University’ or whatever it gets called,” Fine said. “It’s a brilliant idea. I wish I’d thought of it.”

The looming transformation expected from the new board members has set people on edge at New College, where anxious faculty, students and alumni see themselves as unwitting conscripts in a politicized battle over education that the governor is waging statewide. DeSantis signed a law limiting what professors can teach; his administration has directed schools to report on diversity and equity programming; and it requested information about any gender-affirming care that universities provide, such as puberty blockers. These moves build upon a national playbook for Republicans, who, in recent years, have sought to abolish tenure and defund college diversity centers.

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By Jack Stripling
Jack Stripling is an investigative reporter who covers higher education. Before joining The Post in 2022, he worked for the Chronicle of Higher Education. Twitter https://twitter.com/jackstripling