Florida College is throwing out gender studies books ahead of the new school year

As hundreds of books were carted away from the New College of Florida library in a dumpster on Thursday,… small liberal arts college with an administration dominated by appointees of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis once again found himself at the center of the state’s culture wars.

“We have abolished the gender studies programme. Now we throw away the trash,” said Christopher Rufo, a DeSantis appointee to the Sarasota college board of trustees. posted on Friday on X, formerly Twitter.

The American Civil Liberties Union, meanwhile, condemned the college for “a brazen act of censorship.”

“These actions are nothing short of a cultural cleansing, reminiscent of some of the darkest times in history, when regimes sought to control thought by burning books and erasing knowledge,” said Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACU of Florida, in a statement.

Both sides responded to reports circulating on social media that officials at the campus of about 700 students had sent a large collection of books from the university’s recently discontinued gender studies program to a local landfill.

But a statement from New College administrators said people were mixing up two different batches of books. It said the volumes removed from the dumpster came from a routine cull of the main library’s collection, largely to get rid of old and damaged books. Books related to gender studies were also placed outside the library and “were later claimed by individuals who intended to donate the books locally.”

A student who warned classmates about dumping books told The Associated Press that she saw two large boxes filled with books Thursday at the campus’ student-run Gender and Diversity Center, located in a building where staff were moving furniture, repainting and other preparations. so that students can return to campus next week.

Natalia Benavides said those boxes were moved to the library parking lot near the dumpster, but fellow students and activists who responded to her warning managed to save most of the books from the Gender and Diversity Center before they were thrown away.

“What was in the dumpster was mostly library books – they were stamped ‘throw away’ and they were bound so you knew they came from the library,” said Benavides, a fourth-year student. “They seemed to be on every subject under the sun: books on art history, books on aesthetics, books on psychology.”

It is not surprising that throwing away books would cause controversy at New College. Known for decades as a progressive school with a prominent LGBTQ+ community, the campus became a target for DeSantis and as a war on “woke.” In early 2023, the governor overhauled the college’s Board of Trustees by installing a majority of conservative members.

The new administrators immediately fired the university president and replaced her with a Republican politician. Several other administrators also lost their jobs. The board dismantled the office of diversity and equality and voted a year ago to end the gender studies program on campus.

“Every few months they’ve destroyed some part of this campus, whether it’s physical spaces or our books,” said Amy Reid, the professor who led the university’s gender studies program and is now planning a year-long leave of absence.

Reid said she believes books have been removed from the Gender and Diversity Center, a student-run agency that was independent of the academic gender studies program, as it is also closing. She said the center’s sign had also been removed and that it had contained more than two boxes of books, many of which she suspects ended up in the trash.

“Was I surprised this happened?” Reid said. “No, because we have seen attempts to reshape this campus and make it inhospitable.”

The New College statement said only that books “associated with the discontinued Gender Studies program” had been removed from a room “that is being repurposed.” A university spokesperson, Nate March, declined to answer further questions.

Zander Moricz, leader of a group of student activists called the SEE Alliance, said books from the Gender and Diversity Center that were nearly thrown away included books on slavery, a collection of Jewish stories and three copies of the Bible.

Campus police prevented students from removing books from the dumpster, he said, which was loaded into a truck that members of his group followed to a local dump.

“The vast majority of the books were 100% readable and in good condition,” Moricz said.

The American Library Association encourages academic libraries to remove books that are in poor physical condition or that are no longer considered accurate or relevant – although the guidelines say that books should never be removed because they are controversial.

Association spokesperson Jean Hodges said it is up to individual libraries what to do with removed books.

“Donation, recycling, resale and disposal are all within normal practice,” Hodges said by email.

Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia.