Florida has “effectively” banned the Advanced Placement Psychology course from being taught in classrooms over lessons on gender identity and sexual orientation, the College Board said on Thursday.
In a statement, the nonprofit educational organization said that Florida superintendents had been told by state education officials that “districts are free to teach AP Psychology” only if the gender and sexuality material is excluded. The condition, according to the College Board, which oversees the Advanced Placement’s 40-course program, renders the course inadmissible for college credit.
“Our policy remains unchanged,” the College Board said. “Any course that censors required course content cannot be labeled ‘AP’ or ‘Advanced Placement,’ and the ‘AP Psychology’ designation cannot be utilized on student transcripts.”
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The AP Psychology curriculum, which requires students “describe how sex and gender influence socialization and other aspects of development,” has been offered in Florida schools since 1993. Around 27,000 students in the state took the course last school year, according to the Orlando Sentinel. This year, around 30,000 were expected to sign up.
“We have heard from teachers across Florida who are heartbroken that they are being forced to drop AP and instead teach alternatives that have been deemed legal because the courses exclude these topics,” the College Board said.
“To be clear,” the organization added, “any AP Psychology course taught in Florida will violate either Florida law or college requirements.” It advised district officials not to offer AP Psych until the state agreed to reverse its decision.
The move comes around a week before the new school year is set to begin in many of Florida’s districts. Trouble has been brewing in and around Florida’s classrooms since last year, however, when Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a slew if restrictive education bills, including HB 1557, the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill that prohibits discussion of gender and sexuality in kindergarten through third grade. Earlier this year, the law was expanded through to 12th grade classrooms.
Separately, the DeSantis administration has been duking it out with the College Board since January, when he attempted to block AP African-American Studies from Florida schools using another state law outlawing instruction on critical race theory.
In February, the governor, who is running a lackluster campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, hinted that he might strip Florida of all access to AP courses. “This College Board, like, nobody elected them to anything,” he said at a news conference. “They are just kind of there, and they provide a service and so you can either utilize those services or not.”
In May, Florida asked the College Board, as well as Cambridge International and International Baccalaureate, to confirm the material in their psychology courses was in line with state law. While International Baccalaureate said it would comply, the College Board resisted, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
“Please know that we will not modify our courses to accommodate restrictions on teaching essential, college-level topics,” the group said in June. “Doing so would break the fundamental promise of AP: Colleges wouldn’t broadly accept that course for credit and that course wouldn’t prepare students for success in the discipline.”
