Jessica Schwalb writes for the Washington Free Beacon about a questionable graduation requirement for a major West Coast university system.
The University of California system made news earlier this year when it eliminated mandatory diversity statements for new hires. But at California’s other public university system, DEI isn’t in retreat—it’s required.
Nearly every California State University campus requires students to pass at least one diversity and cultural competency class, according to graduation criteria identified by Do No Harm, a group that opposes identity politics in medicine. The exact requirements vary across schools, but they typically prescribe a specific course or allow students to pick from a list of classes that “explore the interrelatedness and intersection of race and ethnicity with class, gender and sexuality, and other forms of difference, hierarchy, and oppression.”
San Francisco State University has among the most demanding criteria, requiring students to take courses in “areas that the campus feels are important to graduates”: American ethnic and racial minorities, environmental sustainability and climate action, global perspectives, and social justice. Some classes cover several requirements, like “Queer Crip Lit,” which examines “connections between ableism and other forms of discrimination, such as racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, and transphobia” in literary works. Another class that covers multiple requirements: “Decolonize Your Diet: Food Justice and Gendered Labor in Communities of Color” focuses on “food justice in communities of color addressing issues including sex/gender and food production, racism and attacks on traditional food systems.”
Some Cal State schools require students to take two DEI courses, one with a domestic focus and another centering on global issues. Students at the Humboldt campus can satisfy the domestic requirement with “Decolonizing Public Health,” which applies “decolonizing methodologies and anti-racism interventions to analysis of public health frameworks.” The options on the international side are more straightforward, though among the classes offered is “Sex, Class and Culture: Gender and Ethnic Issues in International Short Stories.”
Do No Harm senior director of programs Laura Morgan said the Cal State system “is all in on politicized propaganda.”
