Recently, there has been news in the United States that some schools have disbanded the DEI organization in the school, which has caused positive and negative dialectics. Learn together how the full picture of events affects the process of pluralistic inclusion.
Florida College recently announced that the school board announced the dissolution of the school DEI organization, and a similar situation has occurred in the United States, for example, in May, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill prohibiting public school spending on DEI.
Legislatures in more than a dozen other states have also introduced bills to reduce university DEI funding, citing the fact that the DEI department consumes a lot of financial resources but has limited results.
Battles such as these against DEIs continue, with some protesting students arguing that the future of public higher education in the United States will become precarious.
Photo by Gustavo Fring on Pexels
Conservatives call the pursuit of DEI a form of censorship
In fact, the review of DEIs is not recent.
For years, conservative lawmakers have claimed that pursuing DEI has degenerated into a form of formalism. In 2020, then-President Trump said that discourse on cultural sensitivity [1] was anti-American propaganda and issued an executive order prohibiting federal agencies from training on such topics.
Senator Jerry Cirino, who pushed for the elimination of DEI systems at Ohio's public universities, said DEI has deviated from the original concept. The Act aims to ensure freedom of expression on campus and in the classroom, liberating students to exercise their right to freedom of expression, so that the environment in which ideas can flourish is ideal for any educational institution.
However, many studies have shown that DEI-aware students have higher levels of cultural awareness and political participation, and scholars agree that DEI policies can eliminate inequality by promoting multiculturalism and providing resources for people from diverse backgrounds, meaning that initiatives to pursue DEI are beneficial.
At the same time, the research and research institute IUC also said in a statement that DEI helps more students achieve the American dream through college education.
Photo by Max Fischer on Pexels
What do students at educational institutions think about DEI restrictions?
So what do students who bear the brunt of educational institutions think?
Andrew Gary, a student at the University of North Carolina who expressed concern about recent laws restricting racist teaching in public schools, said the move was the opposite of liberalism and said he would rather let the academic department decide what is taught rather than let the political wrangling come into the campus and the state legislature interfere.
Arianny Mercedes, a recent graduate of the University of Virginia, said that further restrictions on DEI will only exacerbate inequality when the school no longer has the ability to provide comprehensive assistance to diverse students.
(Guess what you wanted: Participate in the DEI Pluralistic Inclusion Course in the United States: From the Wheel of Power, I Discovered that I am the one who needs to be included)
Photo by Emily Ranquist on Pexels
What qualitative changes will the decline of DEI bring to the education field?
Kenneth Meier, a scholar of public policy and higher education, said that the motivation behind the restrictions on DEI was not educational, but rather based on political considerations and to consolidate white power, so it should be seen as a warning sign of civil rights regression.
Kenneth Meier explained that in most states in the United States, higher education is not a priority, the proportion of money is not high, and the implementation of DEI initiatives does not have an impact on educational content, as the government agency claims, because the actual teaching content in the education field is still determined by the professor.
The impact of the bill stifling the DEI process is still to be fermented, and there are many questions about the ambiguity of the bill, the excessive expansion of government power, and the underestimation of the benefits of DEI.
On the other side of the Pacific, when we see the problem of DEI receding in the world, we may be able to take this as a warning, and do not forget to uphold the value of DEI and continue to create an environment where everyone can feel at ease and rely on it.