Ray Rodrigues, who heads the State University System, said Thursday that campus groups thought to be chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine are actually “not chartered or under the headship” of the national organization.

Rodrigues, working with Gov. Ron DeSantis, had targeted student groups at the University of Florida and the University of South Florida, saying in a recent letter that their affiliation with the national group aligned them with the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel.

But Rodrigues said both schools have since obtained legal opinions raising concerns about “potential personal liability for university actors” who were tasked with disbanding the UF and USF groups.

With the original plan on hold, Rodrigues said he is seeking outside legal advice and working with the universities to elicit statements from the student groups. He said the statements would affirm that the groups “reject violence,” “reject that they are part of the Hamas movement,” and pledge “that they will follow the law.”

His comments came as he addressed the university system Board of Governors that met at UCF in Orlando this week.

Leaders for the student groups at UF and USF did not respond to requests for comment.

Groups including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression had denounced the original plan, citing concerns over free speech. Rodrigues announced that plan on Oct. 24, saying that a “tool kit” released by Students for Justice in Palestine described the Hamas attack on Israel as “the resistance” and “unequivocally states: ‘Palestinian students in exile are PART of this movement, not in solidarity with this movement.’” He said that violated a Florida law against giving “material support” to terrorism.

DeSantis touted having disbanded the groups during the Republican presidential primary debate Wednesday night in Miami. Two of his rivals put forth similar stances, while one pushed back.

U.S. Senator Tim Scott reminded university presidents that “federal funding is a privilege not a right,” and said any campus that “allows students to encourage terrorism, mass murder and genocide” should lose funding.

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said university leaders should treat the groups as they would the Ku Klux Klan.

However, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy said disbanding the groups would amount to censorship.

“When they are siding with Hamas over Israel, they are fools,” Ramaswamy said. “But I also want to caution here if we go in the direction of … telling student groups to disband, mark my words: Soon they say if you question a vaccine and its side effects, you are a bio-terrorist. Soon they will say that if you show up at a school board meeting you’re a domestic terrorist. … We don’t quash this with censorship.”

Rodrigues said he would provide an update to the Board of Governors at a later date.

In a letter Tuesday to the state’s 12 university presidents, State University System Chancellor Ray Rodrigues said two Florida chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine “must be deactivated.” A spokesperson for Gov. Ron DeSantis said the governor directed that the University of Florida and the University of South Florida remove the groups immediately.

Rodrigues’ letter said that a “toolkit” released by the group described the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel as “the resistance” and “unequivocally states: ‘Palestinian students in exile are PART of this movement, not in solidarity with this movement.’”

The letter contended that the national Students for Justice in Palestine organization has “affirmatively identified” that it was part of the attack, and said it’s a felony in Florida to “knowingly provide material support … to a designated foreign terrorist organization.”

Rodrigues closed by stating the university system is working with DeSantis “to ensure we are all using all tools at our disposal to crack down on campus demonstrations that delve beyond protected First Amendment speech into harmful support for terrorist groups.”

He added that state action could include “necessary adverse employment actions and suspensions for school officials.”

The chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of Florida responded with a statement calling the move “disgraceful.”

“Governor DeSantis continues to disrespect American values such as freedom of speech to extend his political power,” the statement said in part. “To bend the law in this manner shows the utmost disrespect not only to any pro-Palestinian organization, but also to anyone who truly cares for political freedom and freedom of speech.”

It added that the state’s action could set a precedent to shut down any organization that doesn’t align with DeSantis’ ideals.

Student organizations are funded with student fees that are allocated by student governments.

Rodrigues’ letter says members of the campus chapters being disbanded by the state will be allowed to form new organizations that comply with state law.

The “toolkit” he referred to was designed by the national group to provide guidance for campus protesters.

While the state’s action focused on Students for Justice in Palestine chapters at UF and USF, the group appears to have a presence at more Florida schools, including Florida State University and Florida International University. However, only the UF and USF chapters have active charters registered with their schools, a university system spokesperson said.

Florida Atlantic University doesn’t have an active chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, spokesman Joshua Glanzer said.

Leaders of the national organization and the USF chapter did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Rodrigues’ message builds on a previous letter he sent on Oct. 9 with state education commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. That letter cautioned protesters who might go too far in criticizing Israel and reminded universities “of their obligations to punish violators” of two state laws.

It cited House Bill 741, which DeSantis signed into law in 2019, setting requirements for public schools, colleges and universities to address discrimination against Jewish students and employees. It also pointed to House Bill 269, which DeSantis signed this year to establish stronger criminal penalties for committing certain antisemitic crimes.

In the wake of the Hamas attack and Israel’s response with the war in Gaza, Rodrigues and Diaz attempted to define actions that constituted antisemitism under Florida law.

“Israel not only has the right to defend itself against these heinous attacks, but it has a duty to respond with overwhelming force,” their letter said. “Florida unequivocally stands with Israel and the Jewish people during this difficult moment in history.”

It said antisemitic actions include ”calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews, often in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion.” Another example: “Applying a double standard to Israel by requiring behavior of Israel that is not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation, or focusing peace or human rights investigations only in Israel.”

Joseph Nohava — an organizer with Tampa Bay Community Action Committee, which has organized several rallies — said the letters lack nuance. He noted that protesters who are Jewish have spoken against the Israeli government.

“The whole thing is absurd,” Nohava said. “It doesn’t sound like something that would hold up in court as something compliant with the First Amendment…. Israel doesn’t represent Judaism. You don’t conflate a whole religion with a state committing war crimes. That’s the most insane, antisemitic idea you can imagine.”

Nohava said he’s concerned over rhetoric painting Palestinians as antisemitic. He said he knows protesters who have received death threats and images of their houses mailed to them.

Enya Silva, a member of Students for a Democratic Society, said she found the definitions to be absurd.

“I think we have power in numbers,” she said. “We shouldn’t be afraid to come out and speak out for being on the right side of history.”

A statement Wednesday from the American Association of University Professors called on universities to protect the academic freedom of faculty across the country in “expressing politically controversial views.” The organization said it was “alarmed by a number of apparent academic freedom issues nationwide involving faculty speech on the Israeli-Hamas conflict.”

Another group, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, said in a statement that DeSantis’ directive is “a dangerous — and unconstitutional — threat to free speech.”

It said Rodrigues’ letter did not detail any actions by the student chapters in Florida that warranted the order.

“If it goes unchallenged, no one’s political beliefs will be safe from government suppression,” the foundation’s statement said.

Times Staff Writer Ian Hodgson contributed to this report. Divya Kumar covers higher education and Hodgson is an education data reporter for the Tampa Bay Times, working in partnership with Open Campus.

Sun Sentinel staff writer Scott Travis contributed to this news article.

©2023 Tampa Bay Times. Visit tampabay.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

The regulation is designed to spell out how the state will enforce a law (SB 266) pushed through by Gov. Ron DeSantis that seeks to gut diversity, equity and inclusion programs at colleges and universities.

A draft version being circulated for feedback says in part that universities may not spend public money on activities that “advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion” or “promote or engage in political or social activism.”

It says political or social activism is “any activity organized with a purpose of effecting or preventing change to a government policy, action, or function, or any activity intended to achieve a desired result related to social issues, where the university endorses or promotes a position in communications, advertisements, programs, or campus activities.”

Social issues are defined as “topics that polarize or divide society among political, ideological, moral, or religious beliefs, positions, or norms.”

Gerard Solis, general counsel for the University of South Florida, told USF’s faculty senate on Thursday that he wondered whether that wording could prohibit commentary surrounding events like Black History Month or even American Pharmacists Month, which is observed in October.

Solis said the university planned to express its concerns to the state, calling some language in the draft “overbroad.”

The document is “absolutely horrific” and goes beyond what the legislation required, said Andrew Gothard, president of United Faculty of Florida, the statewide faculty union.

“It limits ways for students to be active members of society and speak their minds, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum,” he said.

State Sen. Erin Grall, R-Vero Beach, sponsored the legislation that is tied to the proposed regulation. Rep. Alex Andrade, R-Pensacola, sponsored a similar bill in the Florida House. The lawmakers did not respond to messages requesting comment.

The regulation makes exceptions for student-led organizations; certain activities by schools, such as lobbying; and activities where following the state law would jeopardize federal funding or accreditation.

It also says access programs may remain for military veterans, recipients of the federal Pell Grant for college, first-generation college students, nontraditional students, “2+2″ transfer students from the Florida College System, students from low-income families or students with intellectual disabilities.

The regulation takes aim at the concept of equity by prohibiting schools from “manipulating, or attempting to manipulate, the status of an individual or group to equalize or increase outcomes, participation or representation as compared to other individuals or groups; or advancing the premise or position that a group or an individual’s action is inherently, unconsciously, or implicitly biased.”

In targeting diversity, equity and inclusion programs, it defines them as “any program, activity, or policy that promotes differential or preferential treatment of individuals, or classifies such individuals on the basis of race, color, sex, national origin, gender identity, or sexual orientation.”

Danaya Wright, chairperson of the University of Florida’s faculty senate, questioned whether research on breast cancer or gynecological treatments would be allowed based on the language of the draft, because it involves spending in a way that classifies individuals by sex.

She also suggested that recent statements by university presidents regarding the Israel-Hamas war might violate the proposed regulation.

The document must be approved by the Board of Governors, which oversees the State University System. The board and its committees will convene on Nov. 8 and 9, and the public will have 14 days after that to comment on the regulation.

Ray Rodrigues, chancellor of the State University System, said in a statement that because of the law, “the Board of Governors is required to adopt regulations” to prohibit such spending.

The regulation is expected to come before the board for final approval in January.

They voted overwhelmingly to give the job to interim president Richard Corcoran, the former Florida House speaker and state education commissioner who earlier this year began to transform New College into what he calls a classical liberal arts school. He was chosen over two other finalists.

Board of trustees member Christopher Rufo, a conservative activist, said Corcoran was best suited to “re-establish public authority over the public system” and “radically shake up the institution.”

“New College is still in a situation of crisis,” Rufo added. “Under normal circumstances, all three [finalists] would be great potential leaders of a small liberal arts college. We are in a time that requires a specific type of character.”

Board member Matthew Spalding, who chaired the search, said he also believed all three candidates were qualified but that Corcoran was best suited to restore New College’s mission.

Amy Reid, the faculty representative on the board, asked to reopen the search, saying the school had afforded limited opportunities for students and faculty to meet the candidates.

She said Corcoran’s strengths were his political connections, “but he has failed to build campus consensus over these past months.”

Corcoran was tapped to serve in the interim role on Jan. 31 after the newly appointed board of trustees ousted then-President Patricia Okker in one of its first acts.

On Tuesday, five members of the public spoke against his candidacy before the board vote.

“The fabric of this institution has been shredded in nine short months,” said Kathleen Cody, a member of the college’s charter class in 1964. “Is this anything other than a rubber stamp for Gov. DeSantis and his plan to destroy or hire any questioning of his repressive agenda? I’m just sad.”

Corcoran’s interim presidency was not warmly received, with students and members of the community protesting regularly.

Earlier this year, the trustees voted to eliminate the women and gender studies program, denied faculty tenure without explanation and eliminated the university’s diversity, equity and inclusion department. A third of the faculty has departed in recent months.

Meanwhile, Corcoran has touted record enrollment numbers, fulfilling a pledge he made when he took the job. And in his last pitch for the permanent job, he shied away from talking about culture war issues, focusing instead on recruiting and fundraising.

The other two finalists were Robert Gervasi, the former president of two small universities, and Tyler Fisher, a professor at the University of Central Florida’s Honors College. Neither was invited by the board to attend Tuesday’s meeting.

Before the meeting, students rallied outside the room where deliberations were to begin. Fisher, who came at the invitation of students and alumni, spoke about his thoughts on the future of New College. He chatted with students before the meeting, with some wishing him luck.

In an interview with the Tampa Bay Times, Fisher said he was honored to be invited and came for closure and to allow students another opportunity to amplify their voices.

“I know the word on the street is that it’s something of a foregone conclusion,” he said. “But I’ve learned a lot about New College through this process. There [are] things that need to be preserved about the college. And I hope that our state will commit to preserving the unique features of this college.”

He shook hands, introducing himself as “Ben.” It was late August, six months into his tenure, so he was still meeting people on campus for the first time.

The 51-year-old former U.S. senator began his address a short time later, telling the College of Education faculty how he had lugged 11 mini refrigerators to students’ dorm rooms as they moved in for the fall semester.

He said he had spent his first three months at UF just listening — “exclusively receive posture,” he called it — and shared why he found that uncomfortable: “Because people are like, ‘What, does this guy not have any ideas?’”

About 80 such conversations took place “inside institution,” Sasse said, and a like number outside Gainesville.

Now, he told the audience, he’s “in a dialogical place of wanting to have conversations back and forth” about the school’s future. It was time once again to talk about the university’s strategic plan, a common exercise that invites brainstorming. But as Sasse has unspooled his vision for UF in recent weeks, reaction has been mixed.

In his view, UF needs a new direction after several consecutive years ranked among the nation’s top public universities by U.S. News & World Report. The school must pivot, he said, to “a north star that helps organize our shared efforts and spend the last strategic dollar well.”

He’s suggested that many faculty and departments aren’t pulling their weight. He wants UF to build a stronger presence across the state and nation, with less focus on the Gainesville campus.

He said the university needs to make quicker decisions, figure out what it does best and focus on that. But he also said it should set a goal of having 10 programs ranked in the top 10 nationally over the next decade.

Sasse’s talk was one of his last stops as he discusses the strategic plan with deans and faculty at UF’s 16 colleges. Some have come away puzzled by his message.

Was he looking to fire people? Cut departments?

His presentations can be fast-paced, wide-ranging, laden with corporate lingo and sometimes hard to follow. Rumors started circulating.

Meera Sitharam, a math professor and president of UF’s faculty union, said she heard largely negative comments about the presentations from faculty in each college.

“Everybody was dismayed,” she said. “Every report is, ‘What is this guy trying to do?’”

“Sobriety data”

Sasse calls himself “a moderate about rankings,” sounding at odds with UF’s proud promotion of its top 5 status over the last two years — before U.S. News dropped it to No. 6 this past week. But he doesn’t mean it to be controversial, he told his College of Education audience.

He said he was “super impressed and respectful of all that’s happened” at UF to achieve such accolades, which include the No. 1 spot in The Wall Street Journal’s ranking of public universities this month.

“And yet,” Sasse added, “I also think there are things in life that are measured and there are things in life that we might regard as important, and those are not exactly concentric overlapping circles.”

He then presented faculty with what he called “sobriety data,” using charts with X and Y axes to explain UF’s strengths and weaknesses.

He said he had advocated tirelessly for tenure but had heard that some faculty were in “quiet retire” mode, meaning they were not frequently publishing research.

The 47 most “productive” faculty members, he said, came from the Scripps Florida research lab in Jupiter, which became part of UF Health a year ago. Some faculty have pushed back, arguing that not every discipline is as research-oriented as Scripps, which focuses on biomedical advances.

Sasse said it was clear from the start that he “would be defending tenure against some folks in Tallahassee who wanted to attack it,” but added: “Defending tenure is not defending the lack of accountability about what investments the public is making.”

His points, presented on slides, were guided by a “data-driven analysis” from McKinsey & Company, where Sasse has said he once worked as a consultant.

As first reported by The Independent Florida Alligator, the student newspaper, the university is paying McKinsey $4.7 million for its work. UF spokesperson Steve Orlando said the analysis “provides a foundation to understand UF’s core strengths and the big opportunities.”

The company has “helped stand up a best-in-class process for the new strategic plan,” he said.

For his College of Education audience, Sasse skipped over a piece of sobriety data that had generated concern in previous presentations. He had said that UF has 200 academic departments and suggested that closer to 140 would be ideal. He mentioned a 46-person department where 13 faculty were not engaged in sponsored research.

The university later clarified in a news release that the president did not intend to eliminate any departments.

Beyond Gainesville

Sasse said the UF of the future would need to move faster with decision-making, an impulse he previewed during his second day on the job.

On Feb. 7, he joined UF board of trustees chairperson Mori Hosseini to announce that the university was exploring a graduate campus in Jacksonville that focused on medicine, business and engineering.

But they may have moved too fast. The announcement surprised some members of the Board of Governors, the 17-person panel that oversees the state’s 12 public universities. They later reminded Hosseini that UF needed to follow procedures.

Still, Sasse remains serious about pressing ahead with the Jacksonville proposal. He told faculty that UF will need to raise “a few hundred million” from state and local government, along with corporate donations in the next 12 to 18 months, before “those dollars go away.”

The Jacksonville initiative, he said, would be “a doodle pad to think about what does it look like to build new programs much faster,” and pave a path for expansion into South Florida.

“Miami is the ninth-most important economic engine in the United States,” Sasse told faculty members. “So there’s a pretty good opportunity there.”

Expanding UF’s presence across the state would open new “front doors” to the university, he said.

“The vast majority of the money in the world is not in Gainesville, so we should have front-line fundraisers that don’t live here,” Sasse said. “Some will live here, but very few. They’ll live in Atlanta, New York, Miami, San Francisco, etc. We need to be colocated with the people we’re trying to sell.”

Defining “the thing”

As for “the thing” that would set UF apart, with Gator Nation “singing out of the same hymn book,” Sasse floated a partially formed idea. He proposed pairing artificial intelligence with the university’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, which receives state and federal funding and already has a presence in each of Florida’s 67 counties.

According to a UF news release, other areas where the university might distinguish itself include “space and engineering, followed by business, healthy aging, sports in the arena and in the classroom, real estate, psychology, pediatrics, education/innovation in teaching and learning, allied health/health specialty occupations, public health, and sustainability and conservation.”

Sasse spoke about his ideas for changing the campus culture, allowing students to live in more than one ZIP code during their college years and giving them the ability to leave early to take jobs. While some classes are best delivered in person, others are better as virtual courses, he suggested, so that discussions aren’t dominated by “the five nerds who raise their hand to answer every question.”

In a separate presentation to the College of Dentistry, Sasse said raising tuition for some students was another possibility. The average student receiving Florida’s Bright Futures scholarship receives more money than the cost of tuition, he said.

As a start, he’s advocating for price controls in Tallahassee to be lifted for graduate and professional programs as well as for out-of-state students.

“I think it makes no sense for the median Florida taxpayer to be subsidizing rich people in Atlanta,” Sasse said, referring to out-of-state families who send students to UF. “And right now we do a lot of that. I also would love to have a longer conversation about tuition in general.”

The new president left about 15 minutes at each session for questions, drawing surprised laughs when he tossed a mic across the room to a clinical assistant professor in the College of Education.

Chris Curran, another faculty member in the college, said he saw Sasse’s presentation as an overview of the university’s past successes and a launch toward looking for new opportunities. He said it left him excited.

Sitharam, the faculty union president, said she planned to ask to meet with Sasse, who invited all with feedback to email him at president@ufl.edu.

In an email to union members about Sasse’s presentations, Sitharam criticized what she saw as a broadside against faculty members.

“Instead of considering why some faculty may have lost their commitment to UF, and wondering how as a leader he could work with those faculty to increase their job satisfaction and thereby their productivity, President Sasse seems more inclined to squeeze the UF workforce to make his mark, using tired and debunked ‘accountability’ metrics and management consultant strategies,” she wrote.

Her words included a reference to a succession of political flareups over the last two years at UF and across Florida’s higher education system that have many faculty considering leaving the state. After a 2021 controversy that raised questions about academic freedom on campus, Florida lawmakers passed legislation over the next two years that restricted classroom discussions on race, targeted subjects like gender studies and gutted diversity programs.

Sasse said in a brief interview between campus presentations that he was not concerned about losing faculty due to politics, a group he described as outliers. Instead, he said, he was more concerned about losing them over pay, job location and other reasons.

Sasse, for now, appears to have his sights on the bigger picture.

“I think 100 years from now, when you look back at our moment, people are not going to talk about politics,” he said. “They’re going to talk about the fact that we were living through the technological revolution that created an economic revolution.”

The policy would require universities to maintain restrooms and changing facilities exclusively for use by females and males, or provide unisex restrooms and changing facilities for use by a single occupant or families. It refers to the “Safety in Private Spaces Act,” signed in May by Gov. Ron DeSantis, which defines females and males by “biological sex” and reproductive capabilities assigned at birth.

Employees who violate the law would face “disciplinary actions up to and including dismissal” under the policy, which is under consideration by the Board of Governors overseeing the state’s 12 public universities.

A similar policy was approved in August for Florida’s 28 state colleges after a vote by their governing body, the State Board of Education.

Amanda Phalin, the Board of Governors’ faculty member cast the sole dissenting vote Wednesday against advancing the policy for feedback before the board votes on it in November.  She said she hoped the board would collect data on the policy’s impact.

“I’m aware that state law requires us the Board of Governors to pass this regulation,” she said. “However, I believe it is also my duty to point out that, in places where similar laws have been implemented, there has been an increase in harassment of people who were using or attempting to use the restroom.”

A staff analysis of the law stated that it was introduced with the intent to “maintain public safety, decency, decorum and privacy.” Enforcement would take place after people in apparent violation “refuse to depart when asked to do so” by a school administrator, faculty member, security staff or law enforcement officer.

Charlie Suor, former president of the Trans+ Student Union at the University of South Florida and a graduate student, voiced concern about the vagueness of the law and how it would be enforced.

“What if we have a student who just really hates our class?” said Suor, who describes himself as transmasculine. “Then they’re like, ‘Well, I saw my trans professor, I saw my trans (teaching assistant) use this bathroom.’ You can’t prove the report of us using the bathroom.”

Mandatory bathroom monitors seemed “silly,” Suor said.

“It’s clear what they’re trying to do,” Suor said. “They are of course directly targeting trans students, employees, faculty, staff, etc. There’s no real like plan of action of how they’re going to do that, which on one hand is good because then they can’t.”

Rain Weinstein, a transgender student and employee at the USF St. Petersburg campus, met with the university’s general counsel and human resources representatives to ask what the law would mean.

“It’s very clear on my end that schools do not know how to handle this incoming legislation because they do not have enough trans voices in these actual processes,” Weinstein said.

Weinstein said it was frustrating to feel the need to have to share personal trauma and experiences to have to find answers, but recommended more students try to talk with administrators.

“They’re all human beings, right?” Weinstein said. “And they’re people with much more important things on their mind than bathrooms. And I think we really need to start appealing to the humanity inside of these bureaucracies inside of university systems to help combat against the effects of some of these policies.”

Close to half the 642 respondents in Florida said they planned to seek employment in a different state within the next year.

“The brain drain that we’ve been concerned about, and the trends that we’ve been wondering about, based on what we’ve seen here, are certainly happening,” said Andrew Gothard, president of United Faculty of Florida, the statewide faculty union.

The survey was administered by faculty groups in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and Texas, including local chapters of the American Association of University Professors. Faculty in those places had been hearing their colleagues talk anecdotally about wanting to leave their states after lawmakers passed legislation that restricted tenure, gutted diversity programs and targeted other long-standing practices in higher education.

Members responded to the surveys from Aug. 14 to Sept. 1. Two-thirds of them held tenure.

Lower ranked faculty were more likely to look for other jobs. About 41% of assistant professors had interviewed for a new job, compared to 26% of associate professors and 23% of full professors.

Across all four states, 31% of those surveyed said they were “actively considering” interviewing in a different state this year. In Florida, it was about 46% — and 28% said they’d already interviewed.

The top destinations included California, New York, Massachusetts — and North Carolina, by faculty in the other three states.Almost 85% said they would not encourage a graduate student or faculty in another state to come to Florida and about 36% said they planned to leave academia.

More than 95% described the political climate around higher education as “poor” or “very poor.”

The respondents listed various reasons for wanting to leave in addition to the overall political climate in their states. Seventy-one percent cited academic freedom concerns. Sixty-eight percent mentioned their pay. And 58% identified tenure, the targeting of diversity initiatives and/or LGBTQ+ issues.

About half of faculty across the four states shared concerns over the low number of applicants for teaching positions at their schools, and about 45% shared concerns over the applicants’ qualifications. About 40% said a significant number of applicants had refused offers at their schools.

Fifteen percent said the new laws affecting higher education in their states had no impact.

Florida funds more than 18,000 faculty at its 12 public universities, according to the Board of Governors, which oversees the State University System.

Gov. Ron DeSantis, who this year led a campaign to change higher education in Florida, has dismissed the idea of massive turnover at the state’s colleges and universities. During a July address in Orlando, he said state schools have “seen a flood of applications coming in” even as the new laws he signed take effect.

DeSantis added: “The media will say, ‘Oh, some of these professors are leaving, like New College. Like, isn’t that bad? Is that a brain drain?’ Well, you know, if you’re a professor in like, you know, Marxist studies, that’s not a loss for Florida if you’re going on, and trust me, I’m totally good with that.”

His remarks included a reference to New College of Florida, where his appointment of six new trustees in January sparked a controversial transformation that made national news. That action, along with many of his other education policies, have become major talking points in the governor’s 2024 presidential campaign.

Matthew Boedy, the Georgia conference president of the American Association of University Professors, said he hoped the concerns would catch the attention of lawmakers.

“These universities and these systems, these states, are losing both their top grant-makers and our big fund drivers and some of the best teachers at all levels,” he said. “I don’t think it’s just one type of person that’s willing to leave. I think there are people in education that are upset with the changes. I think there are people upset in the humanities for cuts and I think there are people in sciences who are upset at the bad opinion of higher education.”

Gothard said he was not surprised by the results but said he hoped the “madness” would stop and “reasonable policymaking” resumed.

“Bottom line, while it looks like it’s the professors who are being harmed by this at the end of the line, it’s actually students and families who are suffering,” he said.

Divya Kumar covers higher education and Ian Hodgson is an education data reporter for the Tampa Bay Times, working in partnership with Open Campus.

©2023 Tampa Bay Times. Visit tampabay.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

They had come to weigh in on a proposed state rule that would make it harder for university faculty to keep tenure. The board, which oversees the state’s 12 public universities, was nearing a decision. But many in the audience had other concerns.

Gov. Ron DeSantis had been talking since January about his plans to rid higher education of “woke” influences. He spoke of weeding out liberal professors, killing diversity programs and restricting course content. He railed against “zombie studies,” the college majors he saw as frivolous.

The speakers warned of damaging effects. Some faculty, they said, already had taken lower-paying jobs in other states, with more sure to follow. Top professors from elsewhere were staying away. The quality of a college education in Florida would quickly decline, they predicted.

“If you pass this regulation, Florida’s university system will go from the most competitive in the country to the least — and it will happen overnight,” said Andrew Gothard, head of the state’s faculty union.

University system chancellor Ray Rodrigues pushed back against the notion of a Florida brain drain. In the past when confronted with similar changes, he argued, people made “dire predictions” that hadn’t happened.

Which view is closer to accurate? Three months later, the answer remains elusive. But some signs of an exodus are apparent.

The Tampa Bay Times reviewed records showing an upward tick in staff departures at some of Florida’s largest universities.

Matthew Lata, a music professor at Florida State University, told board members that candidates were turning down positions in his college “because of the perceived anti-higher education atmosphere in the state.”

Talk of the phenomenon is everywhere, he said. “More and more often we are hearing ‘Florida? Not Florida. Not now. Not yet.’”

Help wanted

Across the State University System, the murmurs are getting louder: Some Florida schools are having trouble filling positions.

A candidate who applied to join the University of South Florida’s philosophy department instead took a job at a lower-ranked school in another state, pointing to Florida’s political climate.

Among the hundreds of messages sent to the Board of Governors in recent months was an email from a finance professor at the University of Central Florida who wrote to say his department lost a candidate over concerns about tenure.

A University of Florida employee reported giving tours to a half dozen prospective hires, all of whom “expressed mixed feelings about moving to Florida in the current political climate.”

The African American studies department at UF made nine offers while trying to fill three positions. None accepted.

A report from the American Association of University Professors pointed to a law school position that couldn’t be filled and said some candidates were turning down Florida offers with nothing else lined up.

History professor Robert Cassanello, the union chapter president at UCF, said he hears every other week about job searches at the university where no qualified candidates have applied. He said he worries about the impact on students’ education.

Faculty members, he said, have shared concerns about being called out by online critics such as Christopher Rufo, a conservative activist and a DeSantis ally who has been vocal in his opposition to critical race theory.

“They’re changing their classes or they’re not assigning books they would normally assign out of fear that if that stuff gets published that Chris Rufo is going to come and target them and tweet about them and they’ll be in the crosshairs,” said Cassanello, who has considered leaving himself.

“I don’t mind staying,” he said. “I don’t mind fighting. I think ultimately when the DeSantis fever leaves Florida, I think there might be some good that comes out of it — if those of us who have been here can tell the story.”

State Sen. Shev Jones, D-Miami Gardens, said he’s been thinking about what comes next after a 2023 legislative session that brought major change to higher education.

During the debate over the legislation, he said, a human resources official at one school told him that 300 candidates had reconsidered offers over the last year.

“We knew this was going to happen,” Jones said. “The latest attacks on our higher education system, I don’t know how that plays out in the coming years. It just didn’t have to be this way. There are real-life implications.”

‘An easy decision’

The Times obtained records from four of the state’s biggest schools, including data on faculty departures and searches dating to 2018.

At the University of Florida, 1,087 employees resigned in 2022 — the only time in the last five years that the number exceeded 1,000. Departures could top that mark again if they continue at their current pace. More than 730 employees had left UF this year as of May 31.

The University of Central Florida said 103 faculty did not return for the 2022-23 academic year, the highest number in the last five years.

Florida State University also hit a five-year high, losing 136 faculty to resignation last year.

And the University of South Florida said it lost 146 faculty in 2022, up from an average of 95 over the previous four years. This year, the school lost 55 through May, on pace for the upward trend to continue.

Ylce Irizarry is among those saying goodbye.

She arrived at USF in 2009 to teach and conduct research on a broad range of Hispanic literature.

She said she entered the field with hopes of helping first-generation students complete their degrees. She had found a home in USF’s English department, where she was the first Latina faculty member to be tenured.

But pressures crept in as time went on, starting after cuts to the budget and to general education requirements under former Gov. Rick Scott. They grew more acute when Donald Trump became president in 2016.

“Then the pressures clearly exacerbated when Gov. DeSantis took over and started his restructuring of education,” Irizarry said.

In 2021, at the governor’s urging, the Legislature passed the Intellectual Freedom and Viewpoint Diversity Act. It encouraged lawsuits as a way to address alleged violations of people’s “expressive rights” at colleges and universities and allowed students to record class lectures as evidence. It also required schools to conduct surveys gauging whether people on campus felt free to express their beliefs and ideas.

Then last year came the Stop Woke Act, aimed at topics like systemic racism. It prohibited workplaces and schools from promoting concepts that make anyone feel “guilt, anguish or other psychological distress” related to race, color, national origin or sex because of actions “committed in the past.”

Irizarry said the two measures forced her to add language to her syllabus and review her course materials. During classes, she became vigilant to make sure no one said anything that violated the law.

She said she grew increasingly concerned that someone would take a video recording and post something out of context that would get picked up by Fox News. She had seen colleagues across the country experience harassment and receive death threats. Students she’d taught previously — both liberal and conservative — grew more reticent.

It was difficult to think about applying elsewhere. Irizarry had bought a home. She had gotten involved in service projects, been a mentor and imagined herself building a career at USF.

But when she got an offer last year from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the choice was made easier. By then, Florida lawmakers were considering more legislation, this time with the potential to root out entire subjects, limit diversity efforts and further restrict faculty tenure.

The measures were passed easily by the Republican-dominated Legislature and signed into law by DeSantis.

“It was difficult to choose to give up things that I had worked very, very hard for,” Irizarry said. “But it was an easy decision because I felt I literally would not be able to do my job. I simply could not see a way to do the job I was hired to do under the Gov. DeSantis regime.”

Carolyne Ali-Khan, who came to the University of North Florida in Jacksonville to teach social justice in education 12 years ago, made a similar calculation.

In 31 years of teaching, she hadn’t seen a climate like this. And it was rapidly unfolding in front of her.

After the Stop Woke Act passed, she and her colleagues scrambled to figure out what it meant.

The law said no person should be made to feel guilt for actions committed in the past. Ali-Khan wondered how she could be responsible for how someone felt.

“All of a sudden, I’m not just thinking about what the research says in my field and how best to convey that to students and how to bridge that gap between what the research says and how they can apply what the research says in their lives and in their classrooms, which is what I’m trained to do,” she said. “My focus was that, plus, ‘Am I going to lose my job if I talk about what the research says? Am I going to come under attack? What is the university going to do? What can the university do?’”

In January, the state required all universities to list expenditures related to diversity, equity and inclusion, a major focus for DeSantis this year. Ali-Khan heard from a journalist that UNF had included her course in its report. No one at the university had informed her.

She felt increasingly vulnerable as laws targeting unions and easing gun restrictions were proposed and passed. She knew of colleagues who were planning with their spouses and kids what to do in case they lost their jobs.

“It’s not safe here anymore on so many levels,” Ali-Khan said. “It’s not physically safe. It’s not economically safe. It’s not professionally safe. It’s not intellectually safe. That was not true when I got here.”

This fall, she’ll teach at Molloy University, a small liberal arts college in New York. She said she is heartbroken to leave behind colleagues and students in Florida.

Sometimes she grapples with guilt, particularly about leaving behind underrepresented and LGBTQ+ students, who increasingly expressed uncertainty over whether their university would protect them.

“I can’t support them if I don’t have a job,” she said.

The Individual Freedom Act took effect in July 2022, leaving educators to determine what subjects were off limits in their classrooms that fall. Students were empowered to take out their cell phones and record any lectures that might violate the law, also known as Stop Woke Act. Faculty faced a new level of scrutiny.

But Gov. Ron DeSantis, who pushed the legislation, was far from done. The months that followed brought another round of laws.

The governor has put Florida’s universities and colleges front and center in his war on “woke,” a campaign that has highlighted his unyielding method of governing. To do it, he leaned on his influence in Tallahassee and his direct authority over appointments at state institutions, reshaping the system at breakneck speed.

As the latest legislation takes effect this month, here is a look at how the changes came about and what comes next:

Stop Woke bill

When House Bill 7 — also known as the Stop Woke or Individual Freedom Act — was signed into law in 2022, a series of lawsuits followed. Among other things, the law prohibits instruction that makes anyone feel “guilt, anguish or other psychological distress” related to race, color, national origin or sex because of actions “committed in the past.”

The plaintiffs have argued that faculty are “hired to engage in the robust exchange of views and ideas,” even those the state doesn’t like. DeSantis’ office contends the new law protects that free exchange by prohibiting schools from “forcing discriminatory concepts” on students and employees.

After the act went into effect in July 2022, a federal judge issued an injunction in November, striking the law down as it applies to higher education.

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker called the measure “positively dystopian” and quoted from George Orwell’s novel “1984.” A federal appellate court later ruled that the injunction must be followed until a final decision is made in the case.

In June, several professors filed a brief to the appeals court, arguing the vagueness of the law would have a “chilling effect” in their classrooms and infringe on First Amendment rights.

Several universities, including the University of South Florida, have policies ready to implement in the event that the appeals court sides with the state. A status update on the case is expected in August.

Tenure review

Last year, DeSantis signed a bill taking aim at “lifetime appointments” for university professors. It required tenured faculty at Florida’s public universities to undergo a review every five years.

Professors and their supporters claimed the legislation jeopardizes academic freedom, leaving faculty exposed to political pressure over their teaching and research that could affect their tenure status.

Weakening tenure also makes it harder to attract and retain faculty who place considerable value on the job security that tenure offers, opponents of the bill said.

Another bill that took effect this week initially proposed curbing faculty protections even more. It would have allowed tenure to be reviewed “at any time” by a school’s board of trustees, but that provision was eliminated late in the legislative session.

New College takeover

While DeSantis displayed his influence over state lawmakers with Stop Woke and tenure review, he also has used the power of appointments to effect change.

In January, he appointed six new trustees at New College of Florida with a mandate to overhaul the small liberal arts school in Sarasota. The move sparked protests, attracted national attention and put other schools on notice that the governor was serious about pressing his higher education agenda.

New College had long struggled with flagging enrollment and years of deferred maintenance on campus buildings, but the new trustees had a larger goal in mind.

“Under the leadership of Gov. DeSantis, our all-star board will demonstrate that the public universities, which have been corrupted by woke nihilism, can be recaptured, restructured, and reformed,” wrote Christopher Rufo, one of the new trustees, who is known for his online activism against critical race theory.

In their first meeting, the new trustees fired the sitting president, Patricia Okker and appointed former education commissioner Richard Corcoran to serve in the interim. They later voted to disband the school’s office of diversity and deny tenure to five faculty members.

Diversity and more

Less than three months after New College trustees voted to eliminate the school’s office of diversity, equity and inclusion, DeSantis visited the Sarasota campus to sign into law a bill eliminating such offices across the State University System.

Borrowing language from last year’s Stop Woke Act, SB 266 prohibits public institutions from spending any public money on programs or activities that “advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion; or promote or engage in political or social activism.”

Diversity, equity and inclusion offices have long existed on college campuses, but became a focal point in 2020 as university campuses grappled with the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis. The term soon took on a different connotation after being co-opted by conservative activists as a stand-in for campus censorship and cancel culture.

The new law also restricts the teaching of topics like systemic racism and white privilege in general education courses, the lower-level classes that all students must take for their degrees.

In the same sitting, DeSantis signed HB 931, which prohibits universities and colleges from requiring “political litmus tests” in hiring, admission and promotion decisions. It’s a reference to diversity statements, which have been long derided by free speech activists but are commonplace at public and private workplaces.

Rather than promoting free speech, however, the American Association of University Professors said the new law “cements the decline of Florida’s higher education system by enshrining into law culture-war-inspired censorship.”

What comes next

At a June meeting, State University System Chancellor Ray Rodrigues said the Board of Governors, which oversees the system, will be drafting regulations to implement the bevy of laws passed this year.

Staff will have to work through more than 30 pieces of legislation that touch higher education, according to Rodrigues.

Their first priority, he said, will be SB 266. Beyond banning spending on diversity, the law widens the hiring and firing powers of boards of trustees and requires each board to ensure that general education courses do not “distort significant historical events or teach identity politics.”

The law also requires all universities to change accreditation bodies, and prohibits accreditation requirements that would violate state law. The state government recently filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration over accreditation bodies.

Other laws impacting higher education in Florida include HB 379 banning the use of TikTok on school-owned devices and internet, and SB 846, which prohibits college and university employees from accepting gifts from “foreign countries of concern,” including Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Russia.

Also, public universities and colleges now must enforce a new state requirement that people use public restrooms that align with their sex assigned at birth, not their gender identity.

Ian Hodgson is an education data reporter and Divya Kumar covers higher education for the Tampa Bay Times, working in partnership with Open Campus.

©2023 Tampa Bay Times. Visit tampabay.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

About 80% of the faculty voted in favor of a motion listing 13 complaints against the board, which was revamped on Jan. 6 when Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed six new trustees to change the direction of the small, liberal arts college.

Since then, “we’ve just experienced one thing after another that illustrates that the board members are not fulfilling their fiduciary duties,” said Liz Leininger, a faculty member who raised the motion on behalf of a colleague.

The Sarasota school said in a statement that many of the complaints were false. It said “resistance to change” is a common reaction to transitions. And it predicted the concerns would subside “once the faculty see how all of the changes we are making at New College are moving us in a direction of improvement and future stability for our campus.”

Leininger said faculty leaders chose a censure instead of a vote of no confidence because they are hoping the board will correct specific behaviors.

The motion states in part that trustee Matthew Spalding, a dean at Hillsdale College in Michigan, communicated with former Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran outside of public meetings to pave the way for Corcoran becoming New College’s interim president in February.

It states that trustee Christopher Rufo, an activist who has designed several conservative education policies, “refuses to cooperate with public records … requests related to his work” at the school.

It also says Rufo, trustee Mark Bauerlein and Eddie Speir have not to their knowledge “disclosed financial conflicts of interests related to school partnerships, other governing boards, or income from subscriptions to their writings or test products.”

Speir was initially appointed to the board by DeSantis but recently failed to win approval from the Florida Senate.

The censure motion further states that, when a board majority voted to deny five faculty members tenure, they did so without explanation “or evidence of having read the tenure files or understanding tenure processes at the college, as is their duty.”

It also says Rufo and Speir “regularly make disparaging and unprofessional” comments about New College faculty, students and staff on social media, and their writings diminish the college’s standing.

Leininger said some faculty spoke against the motion during debate, saying they feared the trustees would retaliate. New College faculty union president Steve Shipman said in a statement that the group was prepared to defend its members if that happened.

Such an action would be an unfair labor practice, Shipman said.

“Regardless of what happens,” he said, “the union will defend our members’ rights as we work to preserve the best features of New College — academic freedom, student-directed learning, and the collaborative pursuit of knowledge by both students and faculty.”

On Twitter last week, Leininger and Alan Levine, a member of the Florida Board of Governors, debated what happens if a trustee does not act in the best interests of a university.

Levine said the board could not remove a trustee unless it was part of an ethics investigation. But Leininger said New College’s bylaws state that the governor can remove a trustee if the Board of Governors recommends it.

In an interview, Levine said he encouraged faculty to report any behaviors they felt were violations to the ethics committee, but that nothing he had seen so far rose to that level.

“I understand the change is difficult,” Levine said. “The faculty are entitled to their opinion. And I would never be somebody that would criticize them. If this was how they feel, then they have a right to express that. But, as the Board of Governors, we have an opinion, too, and the Legislature has an opinion. And our opinions are not irrelevant.”

The opinion of state officials, he said, is that change was urgently needed at New College, which has seen lagging enrollment.

“It may be a rough process,” Levine said. “But we believe, at least from where I sit, I’ve never taken an action on this board as a member of the Board of Governors to harm an institution. … It’s to enhance the student experience and to enhance their potential when they graduate.”

Leininger said the censure is a reflection of the uncertainty that faculty members have felt over the past few months.

She said they are grateful for the state’s $15 million allotment to recruit new faculty and students and for the almost $50 million in total funds that will go to the school.

“But unfortunately that’s coming at the expense of our own careers and our own livelihoods,” Leininger said. “So we’re worried about which of us faculty or staff members will be let go without explanation. We’re worried about our students feeling safe on campus.”

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