After months of conflict with Florida officials, the College Board has announced that the AP African-American Studies course would have a revised plan.
The College Board has announced that revisions would take effect with the Advanced Placement African-American Studies course. On Monday (April 24), the nonprofit organization, which oversees the SAT college admissions test and the AP program, pledged changes to the course, after Florida officials announced a statewide ban on it.
“In embarking on this effort, access was our driving principle — both access to a discipline that has not been widely available to high school students, and access for as many of those students as possible,” the College Board said. “Regrettably, along the way those dual access goals have come into conflict.”
The College Board added that, “regardless of how many students take this course, each one of those students should have access to the full breadth and beauty of this discipline.”
Now, educators are claiming that the College Board has succumbed to political pressures, allegedly removing several topics from the course, including Black Lives Matter, reparations, and queerness.
The College Board shared that the development committee and experts who have assisted with the AP course, “will determine the details of those changes over the next few months.”
“We are committed to providing an unflinching encounter with the facts and evidence of African American history and culture,” the organization said.
The move comes after Florida governor Ron DeSantis has openly criticized the AP course, denouncing it for allegedly promoting “a political agenda,” Black queer studies, and the concept of “intersectionality.”
“In the state of Florida, our education standards not only don’t prevent, but they require teaching Black history, all the important things. That’s part of our core curriculum,” DeSantis previously said. “We want education and not indoctrination.”
