Clemson’s Woke Indoctrination Continues Amid Internal Review

by WILL FOLKS

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Last week, we reported on some over-the-top woke propaganda emanating from Clemson University, an Upstate South Carolina institution of higher learning.

These definitionally divisive materials were included in a syllabus for an early childhood literacy course – and contained ideologically charged language which “veered far afield from (the course’s) ostensible objective of preparing future teachers to help kids read.”

Following our report, it appears as though Clemson – which is facing serious financial headwinds, the collapse of its football program and a potential (literal) flood of Biblical proportion – initiated a review of its course syllabi for material that is not “germane” to the subject matter of the courses.

According to a forwarded email obtained by this media outlet, the school’s executive vice president for academic affairs and provost – J. Cole Smith – wrote to the chairs of the school’s academic departments this week regarding the situation.

“Last week, the University became aware that a few course syllabi still contain statements and links to materials that are not germane to their respective classes,” Smith wrote in the email. “The Office of the Provost has requested that all instructors of record ensure that their syllabi only include material relevant to the classes being taught, along with standard Clemson University syllabus language on University Policies, Student Accessibility Services, Title IX statements, and so on.”

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Smith asked instructors to complete “a quick check” of their syllabi no later than Tuesday (September 15, 2026).

“They may have questions as to whether or not some of their material is relevant,” Cole noted, urging department chairs to handle those questions directly or “forward to your dean if you are not sure.”

While it’s encouraging to see Clemson reviewing its course syllabi to root out unrelated woke propaganda, what about courses that are nothing but woke propaganda in and of themselves?

According to a review of its current syllabi, Clemson not only offers numerous such courses – the school is actively developing them for use at colleges and universities across the country.

One particular area of concern is Clemson’s so-called “Civic Engagement & Voting Rights Teacher Scholars Program,” which purportedly exists as “an avenue for faculty to work together to create classroom teaching materials – by faculty, for faculty – to support a thriving American democracy.”

In reality? The program is an indoctrination factory.

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One course created by this program is entitled “Race and Anti-Black Racism.” Conceptualized by cohort member Danielle Hodge, the course claims it “critically examines, interrogates, and engages with anti-Black racism.”

“Anti-Black racism underscores and attends to the pervasiveness of anti-blackness across time, contexts, cultures, communities, and societies, and is an ever-present ideological and epistemological system that is inextricable from white supremacy,” the course description noted. “Throughout the course, whether consciously or unconsciously, students will engage with what it means to be racialized as Black in America–to be rendered sub-human in a society that relies on the dehumanization of Black bodies to create and maintain white humanity.”

Hodge’s purported contributions to academic involve exploring “how racism and its intersecting oppressions are embedded in our everyday talk, communicative practices, institutions, and overall society,” according to her cohort biography.

“Her research and teaching employ a critical race theoretical approach to identity, culture, and language, and examines how systems of oppression impact marginalized groups and are discursively reproduced, maintained, and resisted,” the bio continued.

Her course syllabi asserts that “anti-Black racism (is) inextricable from whiteness,” and urges those who take it to examine a host of questions reinforcing that core belief.

From the syllabus:

Several key questions that guide this class are as follows: What is anti-Black racism/anti-Blackness? Why is it important to use anti-Blackness as a theoretical framework to explain the experiences of African Americans? How is anti-Black racism inextricable from whiteness? How do white folk benefit from anti-Black racism? How is anti-Blackness understood in the context of white supremacy? What is whiteness? What is white supremacy? What is racism? What is racial oppression and domination?

What is racial realism? What is racial terror? What is racial fear? What are racial projects? What is racialization? What is racial gaslighting and how does it perpetuate anti-Black racism? What are racial microaggressions and how do they perpetuate anti-Black racism and maintain the racial status quo? How is popular culture used to maintain anti-Black racism and resist it? How does anti-Black racism manifest in non-white communities? What is internalized racism? What is double consciousness? What is Black rage and how is it productive? What is militant resistance? What does it mean to love Blackness as political resistance? What is Black self-determination? What is white fragility? Why do white people need the n-word? What is white violence? What is white humility? What is white self-righteousness? What is #LivingWhileBlack? What is racial profiling? What is a racial hoax? What is the New Jim Crow? What are Black codes? How does anti-Black racism continue to adapt to the current times? How has racism and white supremacy adapted throughout time and context to continue the racial assault against African Americans and Black folk? What is white denial of African American oppression, and how does such denialism perpetuate anti-Black racism? How does the racial brutalization, racial destruction, and racial policing of Black bodies and the belief in white spaces and whiteness perpetuate anti-Black racism? What is misogynoir? What is digital alchemy? How does radical imagination offer us another approach to understanding and resisting anti-Black racism? Importantly, how can we use communication to intervene into these conversations, issues, and conditions? Once students have finished critically engaging race and anti-Black racism, they should have answers to these questions.

Make no mistake: this is not education, this is far left woke indoctrination. Its intent is not to inform or illuminate, but to blame and divide – while simultaneously demonizing current and future generations of white Americans based on nothing but the color of their skin.

Honest discussions of America’s past are absolutely important in framing its future – and there are historical records of degradation and discrimination against black Americans that should never be glossed over or ignored.

But courses like this are not honest assessments of the past – aimed at erudition – they are deplorable, manipulative attempts to unfairly indict entire generations of Americans while needlessly sowing discord, division and hate.

Such dishonest propaganda has absolutely no place on the campuses of our publicly funded colleges and universities – and we will continue to vigilantly fight to see that it is removed.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR…

Will Folks is the founding editor of the news outlet you are currently reading. Prior to founding FITSNews, he served as press secretary to the governor of South Carolina. He lives in the Midlands region of the state with his wife and eight children.

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