After clash over teaching on gender, psychology class may be available to Florida students

Brandon Taylor Charpied said his daughter, who goes to school in a suburb of Jacksonville, had been set to take an AP psychology course but made a last-minute switch a few weeks ago after “rumblings” about the rift between Florida and the College Board.

“To be fair, we saw the writing on the wall,” Charpied said. “It’s a very difficult situation for high schools to navigate right now with only days until the school year starts.”

In Tallahassee, Florida’s capital, the Leon County school district’s superintendent met with high school teachers and principals to decide what to do about the roughly 300 students who had already registered for the course this year — and who bank on AP classes to earn college credits. In Orlando, Orange County Public Schools sent a message to parents who have children who were registered for AP Psychology to say they were working to come up with other options.

Because the College Board is standing by its decades-old psychology curriculum, school districts in the rest of the country are not being affected — unlike when it made changes to the African American studies curriculum.

In its statement Thursday, the College Board said DeSantis’ administration “has effectively banned AP Psychology in the state by instructing Florida superintendents that teaching foundational content on sexual orientation and gender identity is illegal under state law.”