(Iowa Capital Dispatch) All state university students would be required to pass specified U.S. history and government classes under legislation that is headed to the Senate Education Committee for further debate.
Senate File 2033 would, if passed, require the Iowa Board of Regents to establish rules stating universities must require three-credit-hour, general education courses in American history and government for graduation, and provide credits for students transferring with similar courses already under their belt.
The board of regents would also need to review all general education requirements and core curricula for a report due to the General Assembly by the end of 2026.
The bill advanced from a three-member Senate Education subcommittee Tuesday.
The Center for Intellectual Freedom at the University of Iowa, Center for Cyclone Civics at Iowa State University and Center for Civic Education at the University of Northern Iowa would be required to create courses satisfying the new general education requirements, as well as establish ongoing lecture and debate series. They would also have to submit annual reports of their achievements and the opportunities, challenges and obstacles they’ve faced to the board of regents, General Assembly and governor.
Iowa Board of Regents State Relations Officer Jason Chapman, echoing comments he made during the subcommittee on the legislation’s House companion bill, House Study Bill 543, said the board is registered undecided on the bill but has concerns about transfer credits and how they’ll work with high school, community college and international students.
Connie Ryan, Interfaith Alliance of Iowa executive director and lobbyist for the organization’s action fund, also reiterated her concerns on the House bill, that it is an overreach of the Legislature that will negatively impact students as higher education costs continue to rise. She also said there should be allocations provided by the state to the centers of civic education if the Legislature expects them to develop and put on ongoing lecture and debate series.
Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, said no one questions the fact that American history and government are “clearly very important” topics, but requiring them as part of general education would be a huge lift for colleges, in terms of both finances and manpower.
“We don’t know how we’re going to pay for this, and we don’t know how we’re going to staff this,” Quirmbach said, “I think that there’s a real problem there.”
Looking at just ISU, where Quirmbach taught for nearly 30 years, he said the two courses would need to accommodate as many as 13,200 students every year. With large courses of 200 students, there would need to be 66 sections of the two courses, which would lead to the need to hire at least 17 new faculty members to teach them.
Factoring in their pay and benefits, and those of the teaching assistants who would work with them, Quirmbach said it would cost ISU more than $3 million to implement these courses. For all three universities, Quirmbach said the total cost would come in at around $6.6 million.
That’s assuming the faculty and teaching assistants needed to take on these new courses could be recruited to do the job, he said.
Quirmbach also raised questions about language in the bill prohibiting courses focused on the study of “subgroups of Americans or other nationalities,” he said, and the fact that this mandate would be at the college level and only for universities governed by the Iowa Board of Regents.
Subcommittee chair, and filer of the legislation, Sen. Kerry Gruenhagen, R-Walcott, did not answer a question by Quirmbach to define what a subgroup is, saying the discussion could be saved for the Senate floor or after the subcommittee meeting.
As males are a minority population in the U.S., Quirmbach said under the rules of this legislation, an American history course “that is primarily dominated by white males would not satisfy the requirement here.”
“It seems that in order to satisfy this requirement, you have to involve, God forbid, the word diversity,” Quirmbach said. “And if that’s your intent, that’s fine with me, but I think we need a definition of subgroups before we can really pass judgment on this proposition.”
Gruenhagen and Sen. Mike Pike, R-Des Moines, had no comment on the legislation, but Gruenhagen said he would be moving the bill to the full Senate Education Committee to consider.
