National

DeSantis Vows to ‘Blow Up’ College ‘Accreditation Cartel’ – End DEI for Good

By Augustus LeRoux 0 Copy Link Print
Share via

Governor Ron DeSantis has dedicated much of his second term to fighting the Left’s stranglehold over higher education. Earlier this year, he signed multiple bills to defund DEI programs and eliminate CRT curriculum at state-funded universities. More recently, he transformed the New College of Florida from a failing far-left school to a classical liberal arts college.

DeSantis says the next step is to abolish DEI, CRT, and gender studies altogether by going after the “accreditation cartel.”

In an interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt on Wednesday, DeSantis shared his vision for restoring credibility to higher education. “We’re going to totally blow up the accreditation cartel,” he told Hewitt.

“Right now, part of the reason universities operate as they are is because they need to get accredited. And these accreditors are all trying to create the types of universities that we object to as conservatives. So we’re going to have alternative accreditors. It’s going to be instead of you have to have gender studies, or you have to have DEI to get accredited, it’ll be the opposite.”

DeSantis said that under the alternative accreditation process, schools would be denied for having DEI, CRT, or other woke programs.

“And so that is going to create, I think, an opportunity for a lot of innovation in Higher Ed.”

Subscribe to the Florida Jolt Newsletter!

Hewitt and DeSantis also discussed the successes of New College during the interview. The Florida Governor cited it as an example of removing far-left ideology from universities and returning its focus to actual education.

“And what we’ve seen in New College, just by saying, I mean, basically, we came in, new president. They got rid of things like CRT. They abolished the Gender Studies Department. They rebranded the university as being the best classical publicly-funded liberal arts college, and it’s modeled after Hillsdale College.”

DeSantis said that interest in the small Florida college has skyrocketed since the transformation.

“Hugh, the number of parents across this country who are interested in applying is unbelievable. And they were struggling to get applications. And we’re lucky, because our out-of-state tuition in Florida is about $16,000. Our in-state’s about $6,400. So it’s a bargain. It’s a great, great place to go. But there is a huge, huge demand. So we’re going to use the accreditation. I think that’s going to be a good thing, and I do think you’re going to see a lot of changes in Higher Ed.”

Join your fellow patriots and subscribe to our Youtube Channel.

DeSantis also offered his thoughts on the student loan crisis, saying that the universities have been allowed to take an “ideological joyride” at their students’ expense. The Governor said that the way out of the crisis is to start putting the loans on the universities’ balance sheets.

“And another thing we’re going to do is we’re going to make the universities responsible for the loans. That’s going to cause them to change their behavior, because they’re not going to be able to go on ideological joyrides with their curriculum knowing that if somebody gets out of the university and they can’t afford to get by, that the university may end up being on the hook.”

“So you’re going to see much more focus in terms of the subjects that will be offered because of those incentives,” DeSantis added.

Other stories you may want to read:

Gaetz Denies Plans for Governor Bid – ‘I’m Exactly Where I’m Supposed to Be’

Erick Erickson: A Leadership Failure

Share via
Latest posts by Augustus LeRoux (see all)
Comments
Share via
Share via
Thank you for sharing! Sign up for emails!
Making our country Great Again and keeping America First takes teamwork.

Subscribe to our newsletter, join our team of Patriots, and read real conservative news you can trust.

Invalid email address
Give it a try, you can unsubscribe anytime.
Send this to a friend