Former Gov. Terry Branstad is putting his thumb on the scale to champion a new “school of intellectual freedom” at the University of Iowa as part of a legislative push for more civics programming at the state’s public universities.
The proposal, House Study Bill 52, has drawn the ire from some who see it as emblematic of ideological attacks by statehouse Republicans on diversity programming at Iowa’s colleges and universities.
“The future of our country is dependent on citizens who are well-informed and cherish and celebrate the American heritage,” Branstad, a Republican, told lawmakers Tuesday. “That’s something I think is really important for our country, especially in this day and age when we see a lot of concern and a lot of lack of respect for other viewpoints.”
But it’s one proposal among many that Democratic lawmakers suggest will muddy the waters for the new House Higher Education Committee, which was established to broadly review Iowa’s higher education system.
Urged on by out-of-state think tanks, legislation introduced so far in the committee targets majors in social justice and other subjects that GOP lawmakers say are injecting political views into higher education.
Republican lawmakers say they are scrutinizing Iowa universities’ degree programs as part of a crusade to exert more legislative oversight and cut “waste.” They contend that universities should be transparent about whether certain programs give students sufficient financial returns and prepare them for the workforce.
Neetu Arnold of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, a conservative New York think tank, recommended last week that the committee seize more power over Iowa’s higher education institutions and audit them as a precursor to spending cuts.
Arnold told the lawmakers that program areas such as gender studies, social work and theater, have “gotten into the weeds of politics.”
“Public universities in Iowa are no exception to pushing students into accepting progressive views and ideas as unquestionable truth,” she said, citing the University of Iowa’s recently closed major in social justice and a diversity, equity and inclusion skills course at the University of Northern Iowa.
Iowa’s state universities’ DEI programming and personnel already have seen ongoing major cuts and restructuring via legislation from the last legislative session. The three schools have redirected more than $2.1 million from DEI roles and offices in response to the law and the regents’ directives.
But Arnold said lawmakers should be concerned with public university programs that have a negative return on investment for students, or how much a college degree boosts earnings over a graduate’s lifetime after accounting for the cost of attendance.
Similarly, Andy Conlin — a lobbyist representing advocacy arms of two other conservative think tanks, the Florida-based Foundation for Government Accountability and Texas-based Cicero Institute — said he hoped a legislative push to review public universities’ degree programs would spur conversation about the “return on investment” for students.
“There is value in thinking about higher ed as a pathway to the workforce because, after all, that’s why a lot of folks are there,” Conlin said.
More than a dozen bills introduced by Rep. Taylor Collins, R-Mediapolis, chair of the House Higher Education Committee, would have broad implications for Iowa universities ranging from capping tuition increases to ensuring students do not have to take DEI courses.
Community colleges could have faced the same DEI restrictions under one proposal, but Collins tabled his own bill after Des Moines Area Community College announced it would pause its DEI efforts in the face of growing state and federal limitations on DEI programs.
The legislation puts community colleges and private and public universities more directly under the legislative microscope.
“I hope that the Board of Regents works with us and cooperates and looks at these things seriously,” Collins said of the legislation he has unveiled.
When House Speaker Pat Grassley, R-New Hartford, established the new committee, he said a comprehensive review of higher education in Iowa was “long overdue.”
So far, he said ,all of the bills introduced in the committee have met the objective of trying to address the workforce shortage in Iowa.
“We’ve already started down the path of trying to encourage more of the state dollars to go toward high-demand fields, so we feel this is us being consistent and it isn’t just about the Board of Regents and the regents’ institutions,” Grassley said.
Critics of bills championed by the committee say lawmakers should not meddle in universities’ operations or interfere with academic freedom.
Rep. Ross Wilburn, D-Ames, said it seems “peculiar” that most Higher Education Committee bills are not a broad review.
Wilburn said he has heard from educators who are concerned that the Legislature is getting involved in university programming in such detail, misleading the public as to what “diversity” programs entail and “micromanaging” the institutions.
“It just seems to me that this is put together too quickly, with an end in mind,” Wilburn said.
Iowa may join other red states in forming a ‘school of intellectual freedom’
The “school of intellectual freedom” the University of Iowa would be required to establish would research and teach students about historical ideas, traditions and texts that have shaped America’s constitutional order and society.
Keith Saunders, the regents’ chief government relations officer, said the UI is seeking approval from the regents in February to create a Center for Civic Dialogue and Leadership. The University of Northern Iowa has a Center for Civic Education and Iowa State University offers civic education initiatives.
Iowa would be following in the footsteps of other GOP-led states that have established an independent school of intellectual freedom. Some states, including Texas, Florida, Ohio and Tennessee, have codified their schools.
The school is intended to “create a community dedicated to an ethic of civil and free inquiry, which respects the intellectual freedom of each member, supports individual capacities for growth and welcomes differences of opinion that naturally exist in a public university community.”
It would be housed within the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, employ five tenure-track faculty and be managed by a dean who reports to the university president.
Arizona was the first to establish such a school at Arizona State University with its School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership, according to the Civics Alliance, a New York-based group advocating to stop civics education from being turned in to what it says is “a recruitment tool of the progressive left.”
Curriculums sourced from the organization were part of a bill Gov. Kim Reynolds signed into law last year to include instruction on government, civics and “exemplary figures and important events in Western civilization,” the U.S. and Iowa in K-12 social studies courses.
The National Council for the Social Studies, which says it represents more than 10,000 educators, opposed the Civics Alliance’s standards.
“This doesn’t look like an Iowa bill,” said Rep. Dave Jacoby, D-Coralville, who opposed advancing the legislation out of subcommittee. “It kind of smells like a national bill.”
He also questioned why the bill would target the University of Iowa and not codify UNI’s and ISU’s civics centers, and asked whether “intellectual freedom” was the “code word for hate speech is free speech.”
Emma Denney, a recent University of Iowa doctoral graduate, said these ideas are already represented in UI’s course offerings.
“This is a pure ideological exercise because you disagree with whatever you’ve labeled DEI, which, in my experience, was Black people, trans people, women being represented in education and being represented in any position of authority or having any of their history taught,” Denney said.
State Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, who opposes the bill, said Iowa college students need to be able to function as voters and participants in public debate, and not just be “cogs in a corporate machine.”
Lawmakers advance review of regents schools’ programs
The regents would be required to conduct a comprehensive review of undergraduate and graduate degree programs and whether they align with Iowa’s current and future workforce needs under Senate Study Bill 1024 and House Study Bill 50, dubbed the “Workforce First Act.”
A Senate subcommittee unanimously advanced its version Tuesday, followed by a House panel on Wednesday.
As part of the review, the regents would decide whether programs should be eliminated, unchanged or changed. If a program should be changed, their report should detail recommends outlining how.
The bill requires the review be completed by no later than the regents’ first meeting on or after Nov. 1 and be done in conjunction with the Iowa Department of Education and the Department of Workforce Development.
The regents would have to submit a report to the Legislature and governor by Nov. 30.
Carolann Jensen, representing Iowa State University and the Board of Regents, said the board already has the ability to review the programs. Each program is reviewed every seven years.
Whether it’s new majors in gaming or biomedical engineering, she said schools choose programs because these are areas where students indicate they want to be employed.
“We are somewhat of a business because we need to attract new clients, new students, so we need to be able to give them what they want and give them the job they want,” Jensen said.
Denney said their research regarded use of digital community archives and resources traditionally excluded from academic institutions, including marginalized groups whose resources were destroyed.
“That doesn’t provide a workforce need, but it is fundamental to how we understand ourselves and the world and how we can learn from our history,” Denney said. “I think using this singular workforce goal to do this study is misguided. … This is asking for a huge study of every single course offered by every regents university with basically no guidance.”
But Sen. Julian Garrett, R-Indianola, said taxpayers spending millions of dollars on higher education have a right to expect the best product for students.
“Things do change all the time, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do the best we can to keep up with the changing times and make sure that to the best of our ability, we’re giving our students the tools they need to be successful in our society,” Garrett said.
Courses would promote education on American heritage
Potential course requirements at Iowa’s public universities under proposed legislation would encourage education on American history and crack down on courses instructing students on “identity politics.”
House Study Bill 63, would require the regents to establish no more than 40 hours of general education requirements for undergraduate students, including courses on western heritage and American heritage.
The bill requires the regents to adopt a policy stating that any general education course does not teach “identity politics or is based on theories that systemic racism, sexism, oppression, or privilege are inherent in the institutions of the United States of America.”
Universities could still offer, for example, courses on African American history but could not require students take them, Collins said. The regents would have to establish a policy on how to apply this “identity politics” requirement.
“I believe that as a student’s picking out their general education courses that they should be able to ensure that they don’t have to take any classes on ‘identity politics,'” Collins said.
Another Collins bill, House Study Bill 53, would prohibit regent universities from requiring students enroll in DEI courses or any courses that teach critical race theory. The institutions also could not compel faculty to incorporate DEI or critical race theory into classroom instruction.
Wilburn said university professionals who design curriculum should be involved in setting effective general education requirements, since few lawmakers have this expertise.
“At minimum, it appears to me this type of legislation would be premature,” Wilburn said.
Keenan Crow, director of policy and advocacy with One Iowa, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization, said college students should not be sheltered from systemic issues in Iowa and the U.S.
“I know these theories will make folks uncomfortable, but this is ideological censorship in what should be an institution of higher learning,” said Crow, who opposes the legislation.
Brigit Stevens, of West Des Moines, asked lawmakers to oppose the bill. She said she has two children — a high school freshman and sophomore — who are not planning to stay in Iowa to attend college, given the state’s current trajectory.
Stevens said she was concerned the bill would limit professors’ capacity to foster students’ ability to be lifelong learners.
“This bill is really concerning to me because one of the things that we have loved about our public education, for our students here and our kids, is the fact that they get to explore ideas and learn and grow and stretch, even ideas that they’re uncomfortable with,” Stevens said.
Could community colleges offer bachelor’s degree programs?
To expand workforce training and higher education access in rural areas, Collins is asking Iowa community colleges to conduct a feasibility study on offering bachelor’s degree programs in high-demand fields.
The study would:
- Identify unmet workforce needs and how bachelor’s programs could address gaps..
- Assess the impact on underserved populations, including rural students and those who cannot leave home to pursue a degree.
- Evaluate funding structures, including state appropriations, tuition and other sources.
- Determine the capacity of resources such as faculty, facilities and accreditation readiness.
- Look at potential costs, financial aid availability and affordability for students.
The schools would work with Community Colleges for Iowa, a nonprofit advocating for Iowa’s 15 community colleges, to draft a report by Oct. 31 with recommendations for lawmakers to consider in 2026.
In a presentation Wednesday to the House Higher Education Committee, Emily Shields, executive director of Community Colleges for Iowa, shared areas in which state policy could support this mission.
She said 24 states already offer bachelor’s degrees at community colleges, including Iowa neighbors Minnesota and Missouri.
In those states, community college bachelor’s degree policies address how program demand is demonstrated by employers and students, outline the process for approving programs and set requirements for data collection and evaluation.
Those policies also may consider program duplication and how a community college bachelor’s program would fit with partnerships from other Iowa higher education institutions.
Lawmakers could look at tweaking the current state general aid formula to address how programs are funded.
“There is unmet demand for baccalaureate education in specific disciplines, especially in rural Iowa and industries not adequately served by Iowa’s public and private four-year institutions,” Collins wrote in a letter to community college presidents and trustees.
(This story was updated to accurately reflect the most current information.)
Reporter Sabine Martin contributed to this article.
Marissa Payne covers the Iowa Statehouse and politics for the Register. Reach her by email atmjpayne@registermedia.com. Follow her on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @marissajpayne.