Community colleges’ efforts to promote diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), launched or ramped up in many cases during the “racial reckoning” that swept across the U.S. after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, have run into roadblocks in some states — while being strongly encouraged in others — due to newly passed legislation.
In response, a group of community college leaders have formed a networking group called Education for All, which has been convening to share ideas about how to navigate these widely varying environments, especially those that have clamped down on DEI.
The group provides a space for dialogue about how to continue providing a sense of belonging, where all learners can succeed and all identities valued, says Stephanie Fujii, president of Arapahoe Community College (ACC) in Littleton, Colorado, and one of the leaders of that effort.
In some states, “We decided when we talk about the history of this country, all of a sudden it become so uncomfortable that we started denying it, and we started wanting to limit access to information,” says Fujii, who co-presented on the topic at AACC 2024 in April. “When you look at the mission of the community colleges, open-access institutions, and all of a sudden you start censoring education, when you start censoring information, when you start dictating what can or cannot be taught — that’s antithetical.”
Education for All began as a grassroots group among college leaders who cared about DEI and “understood that it just was getting brutal out there” for some in the field, says Fujii, who serves on the American Association of Community Colleges board of directors.
“This is kind of a place and a space as it relates specific to the anti-DEI legislation that’s happening, for senior leaders to come and be able to not be judged, but to be able to share, be supported and given some resources,” she says.
Surveying the landscape
Michael Gavin, president of Delta College in University Center, Michigan, who presented with Fujii at the AACC Annual, triages the landscape into four scenarios:
- States like California that will never face such legislation.
- States like Florida and Texas, where it’s happened and there’s likely to be more.
- States like Michigan, where a change in legislature could prompt activity.
- States where legislation already has been proposed and might or might not pass.
“We try to provide professional development and strategies for all four of these, recognizing that there’s not a one-size-fits-all, even within those [categories],” Gavin says. “We’re sort of building the plane as we fly it, but we have a good amount of expertise from different lenses to help a number of presidents across the country navigate or resist, as the case may be.”
During monthly Zoom meetings, presidents all over the country talk about what they’re facing and how they’re navigating, Gavin says.
“It serves a purpose of support, but also we learn a lot about what’s happening in [states like] Texas or Florida to help provide some professional development … for states that may not have legislation already enacted, but it might be on the horizon,” he says.
Fujii and Gavin will participate in a free AACC webinar on October 30 to discuss CEOs’ role in navigating DEI challenges.
Potential cascading effects
Julie White, chancellor and CEO of Pierce College in Pierce County, Washington, sees the group’s purpose as both supporting college leaders dealing with anti-DEI efforts and also communicating about the mission and importance of the work on a national scale, to catalyze a conversation that is less confrontational and “either-or.”
“If you want to build a culture of the campus where everybody feels that they belong, we have to acknowledge that, and we have to address that through our education and our policies,” she says.
Like Fujii, White sees legislation that marginalizes groups of people and their histories as counter to both democracy and academic freedom.
Related article: One state’s approach to DEI legislation
“It can lead to people opting out of education, and when folks opt out of education, then they’re less likely to find jobs to support their families, build generational wealth, contribute to the United States economy and to their local economies,” she says. “It can have those downstream effects that impact all of us, and obviously severely limits the options of those folks who are marginalized.”
White adds: “I also think that legislation that limits institutional autonomy is dangerous. Our higher education systems’ highest ideals are to provide for a flow of ideas and different opinions.”
The underlying purpose of cultivating a sense of belonging is to ensure that students succeed in gaining employment at a livable wage and fostering economic and social mobility, Fujii agrees.
“They need a whole set of skills, and the world is not an easy place to navigate,” she says. “If I have a college campus that doesn’t invite them, holistically, to be successful — because my students are not just brains in the classroom, they’re whole people — those underlying academic and career goals won’t be achieved.”
A closer read of legislation
In states that have cracked down on DEI efforts, Fujii suggests giving any such legislation a close read to determine what it definitively prohibits.
“What does the legislation really dictate that we need to be in compliance with, and where are the nuanced ways in which we can still focus on helping facilitate a sense of belonging and care, and meeting our students where they’re at?” she says. “The headline that always wants to get played is, ‘They’ve eliminated DEI programs.’ Have they? Or have they eliminated funding?”
The ultimate purpose is not to proscribe to those in states like Florida and Texas, specifically how to go about their DEI work, Fujii says.
“More so, I would love if I can be a thought partner, if I can be able to share, and also be able to learn from them, as well,” she says.
One focus is on what Gavin terms “divisive concepts” legislation that’s based on deceitful assumptions about what’s being taught, such as, “You can’t have curriculum that makes people feel uncomfortable, or singles out a certain race as superior to the other,” he says. “Nobody’s doing that. Part of what Education for All is doing is trying to point out that the assumptions under which some of this language is written are intentionally false.”
Even when institutions might not actually run afoul of the letter of these laws, they’re having a chilling effect on faculty, staff and overall institutions because they spread fear, Gavin says.
“I’m not saying they’re benign — they’re actually bad bills — but there’s an overreaction,” he says. “There will be parts of the bill that will say, ‘You cannot teach that America is innately racist.’ Well, there’s nothing innate about a country. People make it something.”
But Gavin adds that some legislatures are getting more nuanced and intentional.
“That’s important to underscore,” he says. “There are some bills, for instance, that are suggesting we would not disaggregate [student] data any longer. That is the central part of what most of us in community colleges do” to determine how best to improve students’ lives.
Gavin doesn’t have simple advice for states facing such issues, but he does believe that building community and talking together will help Education for All members face these challenges as best they can.
“I know they’re already doing this,” he says. “But I would say this of any state, whether it’s Florida or Texas: understanding the audiences that you’re talking to, and developing talking points way before going into those meetings, is foundationally important.”
White, whose state passed legislation in 2022 requiring colleges to have a strategic plan around and training to promote DEI — which has been critical to Pierce College’s work for some time anyway — says it’s getting trickier for her colleagues in states that have gone the other direction as legislative wording becomes more restrictive.
“There’s a way to do work that supports all of our students without calling it equity,” she says.
White explains: “Inquiry and dialogue are necessary, but you can do that and also acknowledge that there are historical patterns of power, privilege and oppression, and create space for that inquiry and dialogue. You have to do both. And we have a lot of, again, either-or-thinking sometimes. And many of us have been creating these spaces for a long time, especially in colleges that serve diverse groups of students.”
