Last year, Louisiana lawmakers asked every Louisiana public school to submit a report on their spending related to diversity, equity and inclusion. Based on an Illuminator review of their submissions, there has been minimal spending on these programs.
Attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion—one of the flashpoints in conservative culture wars in the education realm—are often premised on the idea that such programs bloat college budgets and increase student debt. But information every public Louisiana college and university provided shows that about half of its post-secondary institutions spend nothing on DEI. Those that do spent between 0.001% and 0.42% of their respective budgets.
In total, 17 schools spend about $3.5 million on DEI measures out of $2.7 billion in state money appropriated to them in the most recent fiscal year, making up 0.1% of the state’s total higher education spending. The other 16 schools—including every campus in the historically Black Southern University system, most schools in the Louisiana Community and Technical College System and two schools in the LSU System—reported spending nothing on DEI.
Read more at the Louisiana Illuminator.
