(Excerpts from Inside Higher Ed)

• State legislation prohibiting the teaching of so-called divisive concepts is increasingly directed at higher education, not just K-12 schools, according to a new analysis by PEN America. PEN, which tracks what it calls educational “gag order” bills throughout the year, says that just 26 percent of state bills proposed in 2021 explicitly addressed public colleges and universities. Three of the 10 states that passed bills into law addressed higher education. Yet already in 2022, 46 percent of “gag order” bills filed address colleges and universities, according to PEN.
• As of Jan. 24, there were 38 higher education-focused bills under consideration in 20
• PEN’s analysis also flags state legislators’ “bolder and more creative” efforts this year at censorship, “creating all manner of new rules about what can be taught in college classrooms and how such restrictions should be enforced.”
• The  time is “now for faculty and higher education advocates to fight back against this wave of educational gag orders,” PEN urges.