New Idaho law slashes DEI at universities. What it means for students

When Mario Pile arrived at the University of Idaho’s Moscow campus in early 2022, the school’s Black students were struggling. The few Black undergraduates on campus were dropping out at high rates, unable to cope with frequent racist harassment, he said.

Pile was on campus as the director of a new Black and African American Cultural Center, which was tasked with increasing Black students’ enrollment through scholarships and high school recruitment classes, hosting cultural events and advocating on students’ behalf with faculty. The center offered Black students a trusted adult, and a retreat from a campus on which they were an extreme minority — a place where they could let down their guard and relax, Pile said.

By 2023, Black students’ retention rate on campus had jumped 8% — and by the next year, the number of Black students on campus had risen to about 160, according to university data obtained by the Idaho Statesman. They were drawn to the university in part by the center’s activities, Pile told the Statesman. “There was a little glimmer of hope,” he said. 

It was short-lived. Pile’s center shuttered in December, ahead of a State Board of Education decision to curtail DEI-related programming and offices. 

That decision was prompted by many Idaho Republican lawmakers’ concerns that centers and activities like these come at the expense of the other students on campus. They amount to a reverse discrimination of sorts — promoting a narrative that some students are inherently oppressors, while others are inherently oppressed, Rep. Judy Boyle, R-Midvale said on the House floor in March. For years, lawmakers have pushed laws that would shut down these efforts in classrooms and on campus.

On the last day of this legislative session, they succeeded by passing Senate Bill 1198, which Gov. Brad Little signed into law the same day. The law, which takes effect July 1, will “eliminate all programs and initiatives” in publicly funded universities “commonly known under the title of ‘diversity, equity and inclusion.’” It takes broad aim, targeting offices devoted to investigating biased or prejudicial speech; compulsory DEI-related training or instruction; the incorporation of diversity initiatives in the hiring process; and offices like Pile’s at the University of Idaho. 

These programs have “infected” the state’s university system with a “culture of division, ignorance, bigotry and intolerance,” the bill reads. 

Supporters of the bill argued that universities should be supporting all students equally, and making admissions and hiring decisions based purely on merit. Sponsor Sen. Ben Toews, R-Coeur d’Alene, said he wanted Idaho universities to be “places to seek truth and build relationships,” where “robust debate and deep conversations” were not policed.

“The sad reality is that DEI actually divides, excludes and indoctrinates,” he said on the Senate floor.

This story was originally published by Idaho Statesman. For the full story, click here.