Three Louisiana public universities force education students to take DEI courses, new report finds

Several public Louisiana universities force those studying to be teachers to take Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) courses, a new report shows. 

The Goldwater Institute recently published a 12-page report examining mandatory courses at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, University of Louisiana at Monroe and McNeese State University. The institute notes in the report that President Trump’s anti-DEI executive order regarding universities provides an exemption for “academic instruction.”

[RELATED: Oklahoma Legislature easily passes bill to prohibit DEI in public higher education]

“As highlighted in the following report, although President Trump was right to leave university study curricula to the states, Louisiana’s public institutions are moving forward with DEI indoctrination through mandated coursework—at the expense of both students and taxpayers, unless lawmakers intervene,” the report says.

The institute cites several examples of such indoctrination. 

Students who take a master’s of education degree in Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, for example, must take a course called, “Diversity for the Progressive Educator.”

According to the description, the course examines “Critical elements of race/ethnicity, class, gender language, and exceptional conditions and their impact on society, schools, communities, and individuals.”

Similarly, undergraduate students pursuing a degree in education must take a course called, “Investigating Issues of Equity in Education.”

The report provides another example at the University of Louisiana Monroe, which requires some education students to take a course named, “Educational Foundations for Diverse Learning Environments.” The class “provides multicultural insight to support the educational needs of diverse students in their learning environment.”

[RELATED: Harvard rebrands DEI office as Office of Community and Campus Life]

Meanwhile, some education students at McNeese State University must take a course in “Orientation to Multiculturalism and Diversity in Education.”

To address what it considers DEI-abuse in public universities, the report urges lawmakers to pass the institute’s Freedom from Indoctrination Act, which “prohibits universities from imposing DEI concepts as a general education or major requirement.”

The policy “ensures academic freedom by preventing the university from requiring faculty to include DEI content in their courses” and “clearly defines DEI content as that which relates certain concepts to contemporary American society, such as microaggressions, gender identity, and intersectionality,” according to the institute.

The Goldwater Institute describes itself as the “nation’s preeminent liberty organization scoring real wins for freedom from coast to coast.” 

Campus Reform contacted the Goldwater Institute and each Louisiana university listed for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.