Florida faculty ‘strongly object’ to removal of sociology from core college courses list

The board that oversees Florida’s state university system is taking steps to remove a course in sociology from the general education core course options for students — a move sociology department leaders across the state say will "impoverish" the curriculum.

The proposal to yank “Principles of Sociology,” ostensibly to make room for more civic literacy instruction, led 10 chairs of sociology departments and other divisions where sociology programs are housed in Florida’s public universities to write a letter to the Board of Governors on Nov. 22, “strongly objecting” to the potential action.

Board members will take a final vote on the proposal in January. But the department leaders say that the course subject has been “an integral part of higher education for nearly two centuries.”

“A major reduction in the number of sections we offer will inevitably result in far fewer students benefiting from a sociological education and an impoverishment of the general education curriculum overall,” the letter says.

The proposed move comes as Gov. Ron DeSantis has undertaken a conservative remaking of Florida education, executed in part through a new law that dismantles diversity, equity and inclusion programs in public colleges and universities while making changes to the post-tenure review process for faculty.

The letter is from faculty members of universities that make up Florida’s State University System (SUS), including Kathryn Tillman, professor and Sociology Department chair at FSU’s College of Social Sciences and Public Policy, and Phyllis Welch, associate professor and chair of Florida A&M University’s Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice.

Other department leaders who support the letter come from the University of Florida, the University of Central Florida, Florida Atlantic University, Florida Gulf Coast University, Florida International University, the University of South Florida, the University of North Florida and the University of West Florida.

New College of Florida and Florida Polytechnic University are the only public institutions in the SUS that did not have faculty represented in the letter of opposition.

Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr., who also serves on the Board of Governors, made the proposal to the board to remove Principles of Sociology from the state’s core courses during a Nov. 9 meeting.

Diaz, who oversees pre K-12 public education in the state, has supported Florida's book-restricting regulations — which DeSantis signed into law this year — as well as the exclusion of topics related to gender and sexual orientation in Advanced Placement Psychology.

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Students in the state’s colleges and universities are required to take classes in each of five subject areas found in the Florida general education core courses list — communication, humanities, mathematics, natural science and social science.

Diaz’s proposal came after a new course, “Introductory Survey to 1877,” was added to the social science subject area to cover American history from the country’s earliest colonial beginnings to 1877.

“The revision I’m suggesting would reduce the number of social science courses to six, with three of those potentially being options to meet the requirement for civic literacy,” Diaz said during the November meeting.

The other courses in the social science category are "Introductory Survey Since 1877," "Introduction to Anthropology," "Principles of Macroeconomics," "American Government" and "Introduction to Psychology."

Although Board of Governors members Amanda Phalin, Patricia Frost and Jack Hitchcock — who also serves as Florida State University's Student Government president — said they would not be in favor of the removal, the board advanced the motion and opened it to public comment.

In the meantime, the 10 department leaders are fighting the potential change by requesting that the sociology course be reinstated in the General Education Core Curriculum.

Throughout the letter, the department chairs highlighted the importance of keeping sociology in its current position on the list.

“Students have long gravitated to introductory sociology courses because they understand that they will gain a broad perspective on the social forces that influence their lives,” the letter said.

“This is the intrinsic benefit that introductory sociology brings to the core of general education, and it is also what makes it an important component of the civic literacy that we have defined as a goal of higher education.”

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Annual enrollment in the sociology course averages about 2,000 at the University of Central Florida, 1,700 at the University of South Florida, 1,600 at the University of Florida and 1,200 at Florida State University, according to the letter.

The department leaders noted how skills like critical thinking and communication stem from sociology studies, and that essential exams such as the Medical College Admission Test, or MCAT — which determines entry to medical school — contain sociology questions.

Additionally, the department chairs expressed the “negative consequences for the SUS” that could come from the removal, saying that a lack of student enrollment in the course would affect sociology faculty recruitment and retention in the future.

“We recognize that the removal of introductory sociology from the core curriculum does not mean that the course cannot be taught; we will continue to offer it,” the department leaders wrote in the letter.

“But a major reduction in the number of sections we offer will inevitably result in far fewer students benefiting from a sociological education and an impoverishment of the general education curriculum overall.”

Contact Tarah Jean at tjean@tallahassee.com or follow her on X: @tarahjean_.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Faculty object to plan to remove sociology courses from Fla. curriculum