California Community College Drops Multicultural Component In New Courses
MONTEREY, Calif.
Monterey Peninsula College, a two-year institution, has dropped a policy requiring professors who propose new courses to include a multicultural component.
A professor who proposed a new course to focus on film and literature refused to answer a question on the application about how course topics are treated to develop a knowledge and understanding of race, class and gender issues. A curriculum committee rejected the professor’s proposal, citing a state statute that the committee says required the race, class and gender information.
Further investigation by the committee — brought on in part by a letter-writing campaign by the Foundation for Individual Rights, which said the requirement was immoral and unconstitutional — found that the requirement was not mandated by the state. As a result, the committee turned the requirement into an option.
Mark Clements, president of the Academic Senate, says the school still would “like to encourage faculty to incorporate a global look at their curriculum.”
The film and literature course proposed by Professor David Clemens has been approved for next spring.
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