New College of Florida to acquire USF Sarasota-Manatee in deal that leading Democratic lawmaker says ‘reeks of grift’
A liberal arts college seized by Florida’s hard-right governor, Ron DeSantis, and transformed into a model for conservative higher education is to triple in size after state Republicans engineered a hostile takeover of a rival university’s campus.
New College of Florida, which is controlled by DeSantis’s hand-picked board of trustees, will acquire the Sarasota-Manatee campus of the University of South Florida (USF) next month in a deal described by a leading Florida Democrat as “a grift”.
The transfer of the 32-acre, 2,000-student facility, which has a new six-story residential hall and $44m student center, will significantly expand the footprint of the 900-student New College that the governor has touted as a blueprint for his “anti-woke” agenda.
The transfer will proceed despite almost universal opposition from USF students and faculty, education leaders, and the local business community, who say popular, thriving programs including nursing, tourism and hospitality, will end.
I lived in Florida longer than anywhere else. There are no pros.
I live in Canada and still meet older Canadians whose goal is to retire to Florida, even after all we’ve seen from THE USA in the last decade. I don’t understand these people.
It’s warm most of the year, and that about sums it up.
My cousin and her husband have a winter home in Florida. They were considering selling it until COVID. The pandemic forced them into social isolation and they realized that Florida is bearable if you don’t interact with any of the people there. Just walk on the beach and have your groceries delivered.
A friend of mine lived all over the country between work and the military. He says Floridians are the dumbest people that don’t know they’re dumb (opposed to other States where they’re fully aware of how little they know).
and the further south you go, the worse people drive. by the time you get to miami, it’s almost like lanes don’t even exist
i mean it’s not alabama or mississippi?
but yea. truly a vile cesspool armpit of a state that has nothing to offer that can’t be gotten in a not-shithole state
Hey, show some respect for Louisiana in your pantheon of shithole states.