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Maude Porter Wright dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at OHEA.org.

Just a few weeks past the last statewide election where two months from the next one and some opposing perspectives on a bill discussed here last week, it seeks to change higher education to address concerns and bias that conservatives have shared about universities.

This weekend, the state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of Ohio.

I'm Karen Kasler.

Labor Day is the traditional ramp up to the campaigns on the November ballot.

But Ohioans have been hearing about the two issues on this fall's ballot for months, and it's only going to get more intense.

Organizers behind Issue one, the amendment that would guarantee abortion and reproductive rights in Ohio's constitution started gathering the more than 495,000 valid signatures they submitted in March as they turned them in in July.

They were also battling the amendment on the August ballot that would have raised the voter threshold to approve future amendments to 60%.

That measure failed with 57% of the vote.

And the backers of the law to legalize marijuana for Ohioans over 21 a tax and regulate it similar to the way alcohol was regulated, also turned in their signatures this summer.

In January, they had presented their initiated statute to legislators who did not act on it.

So they gathered 124,000 valid signatures.

They submitted them in two rounds.

They were short 679 signatures when they submitted their petitions in July, but came back with more than 6500 more valid ones.

A few weeks after the November 7th election is the deadline by which the Ohio State University Board of Trustees must appoint a seven member Council for the Salmon Chase Center for Civics, Culture and Society.

Those council members must be approved by the Ohio Senate.

That's a provision in the state budget that set up five centers that are described as independent academic units by the sponsor, Republican Senator Jerry Serino.

I talked to him about those centers on this show last week.

We also talked about another bill he sponsored, Senate Bill 83, which is known as the Ohio Higher Education Enhancement Act.

It would ban most mandatory diversity, equity and inclusion or D-I training and prohibit faculty strikes and ideally surgical litmus tests in hiring and admissions.

It would also require faculty to allow intellectual diversity to be expressed on specific controversial issues, identified as climate policies, electoral policies, foreign policy, diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

Immigration Policy.

Marriage or abortion.

Professors and students have come out strongly against the bill, calling that the Ohio Higher Education Destruction Act.

In May, I talked to some of those opponents, including Emmanuel Long of Columbus, a senior at Ohio State and an aspiring doctor majoring in medical anthropology and neuroscience with a minor in African-American studies.

He says students have serious worries about this bill.

It actually takes away free thinking.

And so you're not able to have various perspectives that allow students to be able to be, whether it be culturally competent, engage in various conversations around identity and their future, and really just takes away those skills to be able to relate and talk to people in general.

A lot of people would say that's part of being woke, I guess.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so it's hard work.

It's interesting.

I could laugh like, honestly, it's crazy.

But the term woke.

I think we need to be a little bit careful.

They're essentially trying to take the term what essentially the right is, trying to take the term and transform it into something that it's not.

All woke means is just having an objective understanding of the collective human experience, being aware, being an individual that is willing to open your mind, expand maybe common traditional views, that those traditional views may be exclusionary of entire groups of people.

And so it's important to be able to say that, yes, this is my experience, this is my history, this is my background.

But what about someone else's?

There are conservatives, including Senator Serino, who have said that professors are really leading this because there are ideological litmus tests and there are far more liberal professors than conservative professors.

And the professors are really leading your conversations, leading you to think a certain way.

Do professors lead you and tell you what to think?

Don't they have a tremendous influence on you?

Yeah.

So like I stated before, so just drawing back to that example, so when it comes to that entire National Perspectives class, looking at colonialism, all this information is of course historically backed.

It's just pushed in front of the students and then they have to discuss it.

They have to form their own opinions.

They have to argue it.

And so an example yesterday was made that, you know, if someone chooses to argue in favor of colonialism, so be it.

I'm not going to score you poorly because of that and impose my own view.

But if it's a well-written paper, then you're going to get that.

And so in my own experience as a student, there is no imposing of various professor ideologies.

And in fact, that very sentiment or statement that professors are at the forefront of this movement really just goes to a race, the student opinion that is necessary in order for this to, you know, essentially be scrapped.

And so at the end of the day, students are self-determining of their own education.

They have a voice.

They use it on a daily basis.

We use it.

And so saying that the professors are at the forefront of this movement just goes to say that, oh, you know, students have no opinion, students have no thought on SB 83, and it essentially just silences their perspective altogether.

Senator Serino said he's talked to some conservative students who are afraid to speak out.

They feel that they are being that their opinions are being quashed, so to speak.

They're afraid that they're going to be ostracized by other students.

They're going to get bad grades, whatever.

He said he wants all students to feel free to share their views, even walking around campus by wearing a pro-choice t shirt or a MAGA hat.

Are students free to do that?

I mean, and how do you even really police that in a way?

Yeah, let's see.

That's very interesting because, you know, one person's form of free speech and expression is another person's form of a hate crime or hate speech.

And so you need to, again, take everything within cultural context.

You doing something that might seemingly be harmless in your culture, in your in your way of life, might be harmful to someone else.

And so you need to have the understanding or the consciousness to be aware enough and say, you know, if I care about people, if I am a humanistic individual, if I'm a loving person, then I'm going to step try my best to step into someone else's shoes.

Look, look, try my best to look at how they view the world and filter it and respect them.

And so when it comes to things like Mark Maga or the other examples that you were saying, a lot of that is hate speech toward individuals that those movements and those ideologies have and still do oppress.

Senator Serena says the bill will not get rid of African-American studies, gender studies.

You have an interdisciplinary major here with the and minor.

Are you worried about losing access to, say, your minor in African-American studies?

Right.

And that's a really great question.

And there are all kinds of different courses that have intersecting natures, right?

Different concepts that are that that compose critical race theory.

Right.

And so very much so.

That's down the pipeline of the erasure of those studies.

And they may try to mask or say that African-American studies, black studies, gender studies is going to be or is going to be protected.

But those are the various those those are the very conversations that they're trying to silence.

And so if you're trying to silence that conversation, you're changing the curriculum.

If you're changing the curriculum, you're you're scrapping the course, essentially, and you're limiting the professors autonomy over what's taught in their own classroom and also the students self-determination to form what they want their education to be.

Jonah Hilario is the statewide co-director of Opal, a group representing Asian, Asian, American and Pacific Islander Women and Non-binary People in Ohio.

She is concerned about the bill's language on partnerships with China and how it will affect institutions and students.

I don't know why you would think that only students from China come to a higher state.

You have scholars who come to Ohio State and other universities.

You have professors who come here and do research.

And even students are affiliated with some institutions in China.

Like, you can't really separate these individuals from institutions that exist in China.

That's just like a really incorrect idea.

I don't know.

When Senator Serena last looked at an academic journal and see the level of collaboration that happens between institutions like Ohio State and other universities here in the state and looked at the institutions that are listed there and they're from all over the world.

And anything that limits those partnerships is affected directly by the language that I saw in the bill.

So there is the students, but like there are other collaborations that are happening between universities and institutions in China that are totally legit, that are not just legit but important.

For I was actually a scientist in my past life.

I did science research at Ohio State.

So that's kind of where this experience is coming from.

I worked alongside graduate students, professors from China, and I admired a lot of professors who were at Ohio State who were of Chinese descent.

But also, I knew that they still had relationships with institutions in China.

So how this does affect those people?

He had said that we do have to be careful to make sure that we are watching out for our best interests.

And that's what he says the bill is trying to accomplish.

What do you what are your thoughts on that?

I just think what this bill is doing is inflating the threat of having Chinese nationals come to our institutions in the United States.

I think it is in our interest as a nation to have these good relationships with people from China.

If if our idea is to spread democracy around the world, what better way is there to do that, to bring them here and show them how amazing this experiment in democracy is?

Right.

And putting up any barriers to that is short sighted and just not really not really looking towards answering like we have a lot of issues that our world is facing that we we need, you know, cooperation and collaboration across the globe to answer and cutting off ties to like a country of 2 million people is just, as I said, shortsighted and foolish.

What's the effect on students who are already here, researchers who are already here when this kind of information is out there, even though it could possibly be changed?

Oh, I think look, this is something that we bring up a lot about how these types of bills and ideas impacts our community and Asian-Americans, but Asians as well in this country because it perpetuates a narrative about Asians.

So specifically in this bill, it's like, am I saying that this is, you know, we need to keep ourselves safe, like so are we viewed as unsafe because of where we came from or because Americans are not very good at distinguishing between Asians?

What we look like?

Because things like this, this narrative impacts all Asians who, you know, are seen as looking Chinese.

And this is something that's happened many times over the history of this country.

And I spoke with two Ohio State University professors about their concerns surrounding Senate Bill 83, prong of Johnny, an associate professor of English, with a focus on postcolonial studies and critical ethnic studies.

And Lisa Hall, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering.

You, in a column for the Columbus Dispatch, wrote that part.

This bill is part of the political rights racist, anti-feminist, anti-trans, homophobic, anti-union, anti-immigrant, fake free speech agenda.

That is harsh.

But and supporters of this bill say the bill is actually about enhancing and encouraging more speech, not restricting or banning it.

Mm hmm.

Yeah.

Thanks for asking that.

So I'm going to comment.

There's there's two ways to look at it, right.

What I was trying to do in that op ed is to say this is coming from a larger politics.

It's claiming to be simply about free speech, simply about openness of discussion.

But it's coming from a larger politics.

And when we look at all the bills in the state House today in terms of trans people, trans athletes, in terms of so many things, even HDR one and all of that stuff to prevent, you know, ballot on on abortion and things like that.

When we look at all of that, we see that, you know, there's a larger politics that it's coming from.

And I wanted people to recognize that.

But of course, when we talk about bills, we need to talk about specifics.

What's in the bill?

What's it actually saying?

What's it actually doing?

So there's two parts to this.

There's the political part and understanding where it's coming from and what's driving it.

Right.

And then there's the part of what's it actually saying?

And the other side is also that sometimes they talk about what the language of the bill, but sometimes they talk about their larger political agenda, anti CRT, you know, things like that.

And so this is really trying to draw that out.

Dr. Hall, I want to ask you about one of the specifics of the bill that would ban mandatory diversity equity and inclusion training.

And when you were at this seven hour hearing testifying along with several other people, there was a suggestion made that this could actually cost colleges and universities federal funding for grant programs and research that's going on.

Well, our I'm an engineering and so our accrediting body, but they require certain diversity training within the curriculum.

So depending on what what it really means in the bill, you know, that could put us at risk of not being able to be accredited through the main accrediting body because our students are going to go out and work in a global society.

And so they have to understand how to work with a variety of different people.

And so that's kind of baked into our curriculum.

Another thing that the bill would do, it would ban ideological litmus tests in hiring and Senator Serino said he's concerned about that because he says that the balance of faculty is 9010, which I presume to mean 90% liberal, 10% conservative.

So was an ideological litmus test used when you were hired?

Absolutely not.

I teach in world literature.

I teach in ethnic studies.

And I was hired because of my knowledge of those fields, of the of the literature, of the culture, of not being able to analyze texts.

It had to do with questions of knowing the history.

You know, the question had to do with the questions of my writing and my scholarship.

In fact, I think we need to turn this around.

This bill is about an ideological litmus test.

Show me the research that says 90% of faculty are liberal and 10% are conservative.

And then show me the research that says an individual's political position as a private citizen automatically translates into how they teach.

I think that there's a there's a lack of understanding about how we actually conduct our business in the classroom.

And it's a projection of the kind of ideas that we put out.

So the ideological litmus test is actually this bill.

And one of the other things he and other conservatives have said is that they want professors to show kids and students how to think, not tell them what to think.

Dr. Hall, you're in a science based, fact based field.

I mean, you have a lot of influence over students.

Are you telling them how to think?

I think we're showing them, yeah.

I mean, I think engineering is probably not what Senator would be thinking of when he's thinking of these ideas and this especially this 9010 split, because we certainly have a lot of conservative folks in engineering.

But I think you do have to show them how to solve a problem rather than, you know, the solution.

But there are some things that aren't really up for debate.

Like, you know, I'm particularly worried about the climate change being supposedly a controversial topic because, you know, they're just engineering facts that you'd have to teach that have to do with climate change.

Mm hmm.

And Senator Serino said last week that he is going to change the language on that to make it a discussion about climate policies rather than climate change.

And that's one of the changes that he said he's going to make.

I want to ask you both here.

One of the other things that's in the bill is that faculty would not be allowed to strike.

Why should faculty be allowed to strike if students are paying tuition and to have you teach them, why should you be allowed to strike?

Right.

I mean, let's open that up.

Should nurses be allowed to strike?

Should any worker be allowed to strike?

And I think if we open that up, there's two things that emerge here.

First of all, the right to strike and the right to organize is the right of every worker.

And that is something that we disagree on simply.

He's not for workers rights, and we are.

The second thing, though, is that there's, again, so many contradictions in this bill.

The claim is that faculty or these, you know, just kind of living living large, you know, off taxpayers money.

And then there's that kind of image created.

But by this ban on the right to strike, what he actually showed is that we're workers, too.

And with that, he's brought in the whole union movement and the union movement.

Would anyone say the people in the union movement are living large off of.

No, that's not how we talk about people in the in the union movement.

In the labor movement.

So sorry.

No.

Actually has a problem on his hands by talking about this ban on the right to strike.

In our interview last week, Senator Serino said that his take away from that seven hour hearing where you both were there was that professors would like to tell legislators, stay out of our sandbox, don't tell us what to do or how to do it, but keep sending us billion dollar checks every year.

And by the way, we'd like more because professors are underpaid.

And he said, as legislators, we have a seat at the table.

We're not just check writers.

We care about Ohio.

We care about higher ed.

Let me ask you about that.

Do you feel like Senator Serino doesn't understand your work, doesn't respect your work, that there's no common ground here?

Well, I actually heard a lot of the people talking about how we need a better dialog.

I heard the two student body presidents of OSU both mentioned that several of the faculty who had talked said, you know, come, come visit us, let's let's sit down and get to work on some of these concerns that that people have and how can we really address them as a team.

But I don't think anybody wants to be told what to do.

It's just in terms of the super fine details and be micromanaged in terms of how to do their work.

So so I don't think that's that's a surprise that people are against that when it comes to micromanaging.

I want to ask you the same question, but specifically in the area of history where you as an English professor live a little bit, even micromanaging some of the texts and things that you are told that you must teach to students.

And first of all, on the other question, like I just want to say on behalf of the faculty and students, you know, who came, please don't insult them.

Please don't say we don't want you to play in our sandbox, that we're clowns.

Please don't do that.

Please don't have a hearing that encourages citizens to speak and then say, why did you say what you said?

You know that that's insulting and it's dismissive.

Right.

That's the opposite of encouraging a diversity of thought.

Being able to listen to someone who has something different to say.

Right.

Which we're trained in.

So I think I wanted to say that first of all, I think on the question of history, I mean, you know, it's fascinating.

You know, there's such a move away from history that some history professor jokingly say thank God there'll be a history requirement so that people don't graduate without history.

So there's some irony about that.

But then this idea of proscribing, which texts we should teach.

I mean, that's Big Brother, you know, all over again.

We don't need that.

But the ironic thing is that he gives us a letter from a Birmingham jail by Martin Luther King Jr. And if you want to talk about woke, I mean, that's a pretty woke text.

It talks about structural racism.

It talks about fighting back against unjust laws.

Right.

What I like to say is they want us to read.

So now they're going to mandate letter from a Birmingham jail.

But they don't want us to tell the history of why he was in jail in the first place.

The bottom line is, would this bill is written, as far as you can tell, encourage more speech, bring in more speech, make conservative students feel more welcome, or will it chill free speech?

I think it will chill the discussion of certain topics, even in engineering, when we have things that are supposedly contrary racial.

I mean, I'd just rather not as an engineer, I'd just rather not get into into all these details.

I'd just rather stay away and focus on what I do best.

So I think it would chill my discussion, for instance, of any climate change issues.

Definitely.

Definitely a chill speech.

It's already doing it.

People are already self-censoring themselves in anticipation of this bill being passed.

Now, Senator Serino says some conservative students are censoring them.

Sure.

Sure.

I mean, when we look at the record, the faculty who've been fired from places have often been left wing faculty, especially if they speak on certain issues.

You know, that's that's the that's the reality.

We need empirical research on this question.

But at the end of the day, everyone is claiming to be the supporter.

So so I'll just say to our listeners, right.

Everyone is claiming to be supporter of free speech.

Everyone is claiming for diversity of thought.

The question is what actually happens in the classroom?

That's the real question.

A few updates since that show aired in May.

The version of Senate Bill 83 that passed the Senate that month does ban mandatory diversity, equity and inclusion training, except for programs related to accreditation, licensing and grants.

It clarifies the ban on financial partnerships with China does not include tuition from Chinese students.

The bill had been added to the budget by the Senate but was removed since it hadn't passed the House.

Serino said on this show last week that some changes are coming, including exempting non faculty from the ban on strikes, lowering how much student evaluations would count for and faculty reviews, and setting up an appeals process for faculty who want to challenge their evaluations and post tenure reviews.

You can see that interview with Senator Jerry Serino in our archive.

And that is it for this week and my colleagues at the Statehouse News Bureau of Ohio Public Radio and Television.

Thanks for watching.

Please check out our Web site at state news dot org or you can find us online by searching the state of Ohio show.

And please join us again next time for the state of Ohio.

Support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio comes from Medical Mutual, providing more than 1.4 million Ohioans.

Peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at med mutual dot com slash Ohio by the law offices of Porter Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP now with eight locations across the country.

Porter Wright is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community.

More at Porter Wright dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at OHEA.org.