Arkansas joins Florida in nixing AP African American studies

Arkansas is joining Florida in nixing the Advanced Placement (AP) African American studies course from its schools.

The state announced right before classes began for the 2023-2024 school year that AP African American studies would not count for credit toward high school graduation.

“On this first day of school, we share in their surprise, confusion, and disappointment at this new guidance that the course won’t count toward graduation credits or weighted the same as other AP courses offered in the state,” said the College Board, the organization that administers the AP Program.

The news of the course getting dropped by the state was first reported by the Arkansas Times over the weekend. 

The Arkansas Department of Education released a statement Monday saying the course is still in the pilot stage and can not be accepted until revisions are finalized. 

“The AP African American Studies pilot course is not a history course and is a pilot that is still undergoing major revisions,” the department said in a statement to Education Week. “Arkansas law contains provisions regarding prohibited topics. Without clarity, we cannot approve a pilot that may unintentionally put a teacher at risk of violating Arkansas law.”

Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders ordered curriculum to be reviewed at the beginning of this year after the state banned critical race theory — an academic framework evaluating U.S. history through the lens of racism that has become a political catch-all buzzword for any race-related teaching — including a review of AP African American studies that was in two school districts in the state last year. 

“More than 200 colleges and universities nationally have already signed on to provide college credit, including the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, the flagship institution of the University of Arkansas System. Early credit support for the pilot course has surpassed expectations, and it is our strong expectation that many more colleges will provide credit when an official review is completed in the spring,” the College Board said in a statement. 

The College Board underwent a similar battle over AP African American studies with Florida earlier this year that ended with Florida banning the course and the company apologizing for changes it made to the class after Florida’s initial complaints. 

Advocacy groups are already decrying Arkansas’s move to ban the course.

“Another day in America, and another extremist state government has waged war on Black America while attempting to rewrite history. It is abhorrent that any so-called ‘leader’ would attempt to strip High School students of an opportunity to get a jumpstart on their college degree. Let’s be clear – the continued, state-level attacks on Black history are undemocratic and regressive,” NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson said. “The sad reality is that these politicians are determined to neglect our nation’s youth in service of their own political agendas.”