Accuracy in Media has released a hidden-camera video that it says caught a UWF administrator bragging about evading the Florida DEI ban. Ominous music and flashy graphics cover up what Aurora Osborn, the UWF Senior Director of the Office of Campus Culture and Access for the Division of Academic Engagement and Student Affairs, actually said in the heavily edited clip on YouTube.
- Background: SB 226 restricts diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs and related activities in state-funded higher education institutions. The bill prohibits universities from using state and federal funds for DEI programs, defines DEI and political/social activism broadly, and impacts curriculum and hiring practices. Pensacola State Rep. Alex Andrade filed the House version.
TRANSCRIPT
Aurora Osborn: So state funds cannot be used to be spent on certain programs that promote DEI. But there are other funds involved in running a university,
AIM: Yeah, right.
Osborn: For example, donations.
Graphics, Music cut her off
AIM: So y’all had to do away with everything?
Osborn: No, not exactly.
Graphics, Music cut her off again
Osborn: We can’t spend legislative funds on any programs or activities that are activists in nature
AIM: Okay
Osborn: or advocacy in nature and that support DEI programs, whatever that means.
Graphics, Music cut her off again
Osborn: But really, what it is, is anything that supports certain divisive concepts and mostly that is teaching that there’s a systemic existence of two groups, one of which is the oppressor and the other, which is the oppressor. So no critical theory know that nothing around superiority or inferiority on the basis of race.
Graphics, Music cut her off again
AIM: Yeah, I thought they got rid of everything, so I’m glad to hear that that’s not the case. Yeah, in Oklahoma, they’ve been a lot stricter, but I think that’s not wanting to raise me red flags. So they’re just getting a lot of things taken out or they’re… and passing stuff, they don’t even know what it means, passing.
Osborn: Right. Well that’s what happens when you have politicians involved in education.
Graphics, Music cut her off again
Osborn: So state funds cannot be used to be spent on certain programs that promote DEI
Aim: Okay
Osborn: around these divisive concepts. And since we are paid by state funds, we cannot do that. But there are other funds involved in running a university, for example, donations.
AIM: Yeah
Osborn: Those funds can be used on supporting these types of programs. But who are the personnel who are organizing them? State fund person.
AIM: Gotcha, okay.
Osborn: Student fees are not prohibited expenditures.
AIM: Okay
Osborn: But then you have our students who it’s hard to get them to commit to a lunch, much less an entire
AIM: Right
Osborn: Some programming around inclusive or DEI programming or what have you. And I think what we’re seeing here is DEI in and of itself is good for society. I think at the extreme, DEI can be exclusive and not be open to viewpoint diversity.
AIM: Hmmm
Osborn: And then so what happens is the pendulum swings on the other side, and you have the conservatives saying that DEI is teaching our kids to hate white people and men and straight people
Aim: Yeah
Obsorn: Which neither of those things are true.
WHAT DOES ANDRADE SAY ABOUT AIM VIDEO
State Rep. Alex Andrade filed the House version of the DEI law seven days before Senator Erin Grall filed SB 226. I asked him to watch the video and share his comments.
Andrade said Osborn sounded like she was complaining that the UWF is following the law that he authored.
- “She’s allowed to have dumb opinions,” the state lawmaker said. “We aren’t the thought police.”
He joked:
“So a low-level UWF employee doesn’t share my worldview, excuse me while I clutch my pearls.”
WHO IS MISLEADING WHO
AIM appealed to its readers: If you believe radicals like this should not be involved in pushing their pro-DEI agenda, go to SaveWestFlorida.com to demand that the Board of Trustees of UWF remove these extremists and end DEI.
Of course, the group that has opposed Gov. DeSantis’ takeover of the UWF Board of Trustees is SAVE UWF, and its website is saveuwf.com, not SaveWestFlorida.com.
What happens when you click? The title under the logo is “Save UWF.”
The message is: “A radical administrator should not be plotting ways to undermine the spirit of Florida law to support her ideological viewpoint.”
Readers can send a generic email to a lawmaker or UWF Trustee demanding she be removed, and we thought the Right was against “cancel culture.”
UWF Reality Check
If the accusation that the University of West Florida, led by President Martha Saunders, is overrun with radicals is true, which it is not, the statistics show that UWF has thrived under Saunders’ leadership.
In the 2023-24 performance-based funding model, UWF earned a total of 84 points out of 100, which is two points higher than the previous year and only one less than the University of West Florida.
UWF earned high marks in Metric 10, which measures the percentage of baccalaureate graduates completing two or more types of high-impact practices. The university increased to 60.6%, well above the 51% benchmark for excellence.More than 79% of bachelor’s graduates are employed or furthering their education one year after graduation, ranking UWF 2nd in the Florida State University System for Metric 1. UWF graduates earned a median wage of $53,000 in 2021-22, setting a new record for the university and increasing by $4,200 from the previous year.
UWF has been ranked among the top 15 public regional institutions in the South by U.S. News & World Report for multiple years and was named a “Great College to Work For” by ModernThink and The Chronicle of Higher Education
Saunders established Florida’s first doctoral program in intelligent systems and robotics, in partnership with the Florida Institute of Human Machine Cognition, and Florida’s first bachelor’s degree in cybersecurity, which earned designation as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity by the National Security Agency and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
She led the reorganization of UWF’s colleges and guided the establishment of two new named colleges: the Usha Kundu, MD College of Health, and the Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering.
And students have flocked to UWF. In Fall 2024, UWF achieved its highest enrollment in the university’s 56-year history, with more than 14,700 students enrolled—a milestone representing an 11% increase in overall enrollment compared to the previous year. UWF welcomed its 16th National Merit Finalist in 2024, a significant achievement considering there had been none before Dr. Saunders’ presidency.
She launched the “Here for Good” capital campaign in April 2024, which has secured $65 million toward its $90 million goal.
The 2024 Intellectual Freedom and Viewpoint Diversity Survey found that cancel culture, limitations on free speech and indoctrination are not problems at the University of West Florida. 65% of UWF students said the mood on campus was equally tolerant of both liberal and conservative ideas and beliefs, higher than the State University Student (SUS) average of 51% and the Buckley National Student Sample (36%).
Photo Licensed under the Unsplash+ License
Well said. If AIM is worried about the spirit of the law, they should look into how the governor’s office is coordinating university takeovers by exploiting a loophole in the Sunshine laws, which don’t expressly forbid collusion with a third party. Or maybe AIM should investigate the wasted resources of running university president searches when the governor has handpicked the winners.