UF community defends value of women’s studies amid DEI rollbacks
ADVOCATES ARGUE THE PROGRAM’S LASTING IMPACT GOES BEYOND THE CLASSROOM
By Grace McClung Alligator Staff Writer
Fifty years ago, Irene Thompson stood before a sea of 370 students, preparing to teach UF’s first womenoriented course. She felt overwhelmed. The English department thought she was out of her mind. So did the administration.
The course — "Images of Women in Literature from Ovid through Norman Mailer” — met one evening a week and attracted an even split of men and women. According to Thomspon, many of the male students enrolled in the course because their girlfriends were taking it. Other students expected a “rap session,” and some simply wanted to play “devil’s advocate.”
By the second week, nearly 300 students dropped the course. But the 72 men and women who stayed helped mark a milestone in Thompson’s quest to establish UF’s women’s studies program, which the university formally authorized in 1977.
Now, less than 50 years later, state lawmakers are putting the program’s progress in jeopardy.
A ‘breadth of education’
In January, the state university system’s Board of Governors voted to strip women’s studies courses — among hundreds of others — from UF’s general education catalog. The decision stemmed from a 2023 state law directing universities to purge “identity politics” and “unproven, speculative, or exploratory content” from general education offerings.
An earlier version of the law banned women’s studies outright, though the measure was dropped from the final bill. Florida is one of a growing number of states where women’s and gender studies have been targeted by Republican lawmakers, who see the programs as illequipped to prepare graduates for the workforce and a waste of taxpayer dollars.
“You’re going to have a truck driver pay for someone’s degree in gender studies. No, that doesn’t make sense,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said at a 2023 rally in Iowa.
Most recently, the Board of Governors commissioned a system-wide pilot study to assess the “return on investment” of women’s and gender studies programs, along with four STEM fields — a move some faculty and Democratic lawmakers see as an attempt to devalue the
Detainees allege abuse, isolation at Baker County Detention Center
FILED COMPLAINTS SHOW LACK OF MEDICAL CARE, UNSANITARY CONDITIONS
By Vera Lucia Pappaterra Alligator Staff Writer
Freezing temperatures, soiled clothing and scarce medical attention are among the daily realities reported by detainees inside the Baker County Detention Center.
The U.S. Immigration and Enforcement detention center in Macclenny, about 50 minutes north of Gainesville, is one of four facilities in Florida that houses undocumented immigrants. Yet according to advocates and filed com-
plaints, the Baker facility is also the site of abuse and neglect.
The Baker facility has received 259 complaints since 2017, comprising over half of the 470 total across the state’s four detention centers.
Alice Gridley leads Baker Interfaith Friends, a group that visits the detention center and offers support to the people taken into detention and their families who are left behind. Much of Gridley’s work involves speaking with detainees, offering support and momentary relief from the alleged ongoing abuse at the detention center.
She and other volunteers try to bridge the gap for detainees, making phone calls to detainees’ loved ones. Most of the time, all detainees asked for was for
someone to let their family know where and how they were.
“The first time I went, I have to admit, I was kind of in shock, because I had no idea what was going on in detention centers,” Gridley said.
Still, after six years of volunteering and meeting with detainees at Baker, Gridley said she’s stunned by what she hears and sees.
Visitors at the Baker facility are only allowed to speak with detainees through a video monitor at the detention center for 15 minutes at a time. After the COVID-19 pandemic, visits were relegated to at-home virtual meetings through HomeWAV, an inmate communication
Noah Lantor // Alligator Staff Florida Gators guard Walter Clayton Jr. (1) passes the ball during a basketball game against UConn in the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Sunday, March 23, 2025, in Raleigh, N.C. Read more in Sports on pg. 12.
Today’s Weather
Gainesville USPS workers, supporters rally against DOGE’s plans to slash postal service
PROTESTORS CRITICIZED POTENTIAL JOB CUTS, LOSS OF FUNDING AND PRIVATIZATION
By Pristine Thai Alligator Staff Writer
More than 75 mail carriers, postal service workers and supporters gathered near UF’s campus on March 23 to protest the Trump administration’s proposed changes to the U.S. Postal Service, which include cutting 10,000 jobs, billions of dollars and potentially privatizing the federal agency.
Spanning all four corners of the intersection at University Avenue and 13th Street, the rally was one of more than 200 nationwide organized by local branches of the National Association of Letter Carriers, a labor union representing the USPS’s nonrural letter carriers.
The rallies came after outgoing U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy's agreement to reform the USPS with the help of tech mogul Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. Gainesville’s NALC branch wrote in a statement that DOGE will “carve up” and “take away the independence” of the USPS.
Local union members at the protest donned red shirts blazoned with “Fight Like Hell!” Some protestors wore star-spangled attire or waved American flags as passing vehicles honked their horns repeatedly in support, prompting cheers from protestors. Many held signs saying “Our U.S. mail is not for sale” or “Hands off USPS.” Other signs made reference to Musk, declaring he should be subpoenaed or sent to Guantanamo Bay.
George Atwood, the treasurer of Gainesville’s NALC branch, has been a USPS mail carrier for almost 30
years. As one of nearly 73,000 veterans employed by the postal service, Atwood said he felt the highly structured operations mirrored the work environment he grew accustomed to in the military.
Working for a federal entity like the USPS also allows him to receive credit for his military service time toward retirement. Privatizing the USPS could erase that benefit, he said, preventing him and other veterans in civil service from retiring early.
Service members aren’t the only people who could be affected by privatization, Atwood said.
“Rural America will lose,” he said, citing concerns that a privatized postal service would neglect deliveries to more remote communities because it isn’t profitable. The USPS serves as a “last mile” carrier to the 51.5 million addresses that private carriers don’t deliver directly to.
P.K. Compton, a union representative for the local branch of the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association, said privatization could drastically affect the people he delivers mail to.
People in rural areas would have to pay a premium to get their mail, Compton said, “or they’re just not going to get them at all.” He said older people or those without reliable transportation would struggle to get their medicine or mail-in ballots.
Beyond the delivery services, the community aspect of mail delivery is critical to more isolated addresses, said Addie Harford, president of Gainesville’s NALC branch. She said social interaction between mail workers and their customers gave “a sense of normality” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“When everything was shut down, the mailman still was there,” Harford said. “It gave people that
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glimmer of hope that we’re going to come out of this.”
The USPS has been a constant in American society since its founding in 1775, intended to spread revolutionary ideals throughout the colonies before transforming into an expansive mail delivery network that serves every address in the country.
“We’re older than the Constitution itself,” said Mackenzie Bowden, the outreach lead for the political action committee of Gainesville’s NALC branch. “We are a central part of this government and of this country.”
Bowden has been a mail carrier for six years, and she said her favorite part of the job is bonding with the people she serves. Having a regular route, seeing the same people every day and getting to wish them a “Merry Christmas” is so important to the community structure, she said.
She read aloud part of the USPS’s unofficial motto: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”
“We hold that dearly to our hearts,” she said, referring to the mantra. “A hurricane comes through, we’re still delivering mail. A tornado comes through, we’re still delivering mail. Wildfires happen, and we still deliver mail. That sense of normalcy is very, very important to us, and we kind of hold this country together, man.”
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Mail workers protest the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to the United States Postal Service in Gainesville, Fla. on Sunday, March 23, 2025.
UF discusses DEI
program.
But students, alumni and faculty argue the program’s value extends beyond the classroom — preparing graduates for a myriad of career paths.
Andreina Fernandez, a 29-yearold acquisitions editor at The University of North Carolina Press, graduated from UF in 2020 with a master’s in women’s studies. She credited the master’s program with shaping her career and said everything she learned at UF directly applies to her daily work.
“The center was a phenomenal place to study and develop as a thinker,” she said. “It really enriched my intellectual curiosity … It was so valuable to me and has really developed me as a person and a professional.”
UF’s Department of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies offers academic programs, grants and graduate and undergraduate degrees as well as advanced research opportunities, according to its website. It offers an interdisciplinary style of learning, allowing students to focus on areas that interest them by offering graduate certificates in various fields.
Fernandez opted for a certificate in Latin American Studies and said the “breadth of education” she received gave her “mental agility” that has served her well post-graduation.
Impact of DEI rollbacks
In February, UF ceased several diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility activities after President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning DEI initiatives funded by federal grants. The move came a year after UF eliminated $5 million in spending on diversity programs to comply with a new state-level ban.
While neither the state nor the federal government has directly banned or defunded women’s studies at UF or other universities, the campaign against DEI has
sparked fear that programs perceived as traditionally left-leaning — like women’s studies — could be targeted next.
Fernandez called the recent attacks on DEI a “detriment” to students.
“It's taking away the ability to learn these new kinds of skills… like how to talk to other people and how to engage with people who are different from you,” Fernandez said. “That’s an essential part of an education.”
Since 1977, UF’s Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies has had ten directors and grown to encompass 13 core faculty members. Its master’s program is fully funded, meaning students can receive a tuition remission or stipend as part of an assistantship — a huge draw for those seeking to advance their careers.
“The Women's Studies Department has made so many strides in the past,” Fernandez said. “I would hate to see all of that growth thwarted.”
Divya Huilgol, a 19-year-old women’s studies sophomore, was initially a biochemistry major and said she only took a women’s studies course as a “fun little elective.” But she said she soon realized its value — even as a premed student — and decided to switch majors.
“It was an avenue in which I felt like I could learn more about myself and at the same time also learn about how I could relate to anybody that's sitting in front of me,” she said. “It's definitely been really important in the way that I connect with others.”
Huilgol, who is pursuing an outside concentration in health equities and social justice, said women’s studies has helped her stand out from her pre-med peers, and it’s frustrating that future students might not receive the same opportunity.
The women’s studies department recently lost all eight of its general education courses, a
It wasn't until 1977, roughly 30 years after UF became coeducational, that UF's first women's studies program was established after immense pushback. Less than 50 years later, this program is threatened once again due to the recent crackdown on DEI.
change Huilgol fears could lead to enrollment decline in the major since students will have less incentive to take the classes. A drop in enrollment, she said, could risk the program’s future.
“It's really disheartening because this department has made a lot of career opportunities for us,” she said.
Taylor Burtch, a 30-year-old researcher at the nonprofit organization Education Northwest, graduated from UF’s women’s studies master’s program in 2018. Like Huilgol, Burtch stumbled upon women’s studies through an elective as an undergraduate at the University of Toledo and quickly realized she wanted to integrate its principles into her career.
She said her improved ability to understand different perspectives has been “invaluable” to her
work, which includes researching, providing technical assistance and engaging with the community.
“It helps you take an equity lens to all of your work,” she said. “There are just a multitude of experiences that are often excluded from scholarship and from research and from history, and gender studies is just a really good place to be able to examine those things.”
Burtch declined to comment on recent DEI legislation.
Angel Kwolek-Folland, a former director of the program, said the women’s studies major gives students a “solid background for virtually anything a person wants to do.”
“It teaches you critical thinking. It teaches you about how the world works…. It helps you understand the power dynamics of
the workplace,” she said. “It’s really a multi-purpose degree.”
Despite its benefits, KwolekFolland said she doesn’t think the program will be able to significantly grow given the political climate. Talk of a doctoral women’s studies program has been put on the backburner due to the challenges the department is facing, she said.
Still, she’s optimistic about the future of women’s studies.
“The knowledge is still there. There will still be people who will want to be teaching courses,” she said. “They’ll still be students wanting to know. You can legislate something away, but you can’t stop people from wanting to know.”
@gracenmclung gmcclung@alligator.org
Jea Nace // Alligator Staff
Detainees in ICE detention center allege mistreatment
platform. The center has not returned to in-house communication since the pandemic.
Often, she said, detainees disappear after a visit. Someone they spoke with on one visit might be in the process or deported by the time the volunteers returned.
Many immigrants being held at the Baker facility are transferred from regions hours away, Gridley said, limiting access to friends and family. A lot of the detainees Gridley spoke with are from south Florida, Macclenny being a three to six hour drive for their family and lawyers to visit, she said.
“They got very few visitors. And that was deliberate. They tried to make it difficult for people to visit them,” Gridley said.
She described “inhuman” conditions inside the center: soiled clothes handed out to new arrivals, inadequate medical care and, in her view, an atmosphere of fear.
The Baker County Detention Center didn’t respond to The Alligator’s three requests for comment.
“Most of the people that I talked with were very grateful to be in the U.S. at that point in time, but scared, very scared,” Gridley said. “Detention center was kind of a polite name for really what I considered the torture chamber.”
Over time, Gridley said she’s listened to countless stories of what she calls “disturbing” incidents.
She recalled one man from Scotland, who was married to a U.S. citizen and had serious medical conditions, was deported by plane despite being medically unfit to fly, according to his wife’s pleas.
She also cited the story of a de-
tainee she called Ana, a woman picked up in Florida who didn’t speak English.
“They ruled her uncooperative, so they put her in detention,” Gridley said. “Keep in mind that it’s 53 degrees. They stripped her down to her underwear initially, and then at a later point, they stripped her underwear, and so she had nothing in that solitary cell. They would go by the door and look in the window and laugh at her.”
The ACLU of Florida filed a civil rights complaint on Ana’s behalf last year.
Another detainee Gridley spoke with suffered broken ribs when he was assaulted by another detainee on his first day. He received no medical attention, Gridley said, and was reassigned to an upper bunk he could not climb. The man slept on
the floor.
When volunteers from Baker Interfaith Friends discovered the facility lacked a law library, they donated law books, she said. Soon after, Gridley said, the sheriff decided to stop accepting book donations.
A firsthand perspective
Robin Poynor, a tenured UF visual arts professor, became deeply involved with Baker Interfaith Friends after hearing a talk about immigration at a retired faculty luncheon nearly a decade ago. When someone mentioned volunteers regularly visiting Baker County Detention Center, he was intrigued. He joined Baker Interfaith Friends in its early years. Poynor recalled traveling to the center on Mondays, when volunteers still spoke to detainees through video monitors in-
stalled in concrete-block cubicles. Because of a hearing difficulty, he was eventually granted permission to meet detainees in a room typically reserved for attorneys, a setup that allowed face-to-face conversation through glass.
“They would bring them in one by one, shackled arms and feet,” Poynor said. “They would take the shackles off their arms when they put them into the little room, lock them in … so we could communicate.”
Many people he met had lived in Florida for most of their lives. Some were married to U.S. citizens and had U.S.-born children. Others arrived only recently. Regardless of personal history, Poynor said he found one constant theme: detainees were isolated and unsure of what the future held.
Although COVID-19 forced the facility to switch to remote visits via the HomeWAV platform, Poynor remains committed to connecting with detainees and preserving a sense of human contact.
“We don’t want to direct the conversation,” he said. “We want them to take advantage of having somebody to talk to.”
ACLU of Florida alleges legal violations
The ACLU of Florida, a civil rights law advocacy organization, has filed a lawsuit alleging Baker County Detention Center has violated detainees’ rights to counsel and due process. The facility canceled legal visits after the ACLU and partner organizations became outspoken about conditions there, ACLU Florida attorney Amy Godshall said.
“This is civil detention, not criminal detention,” she said. “People are not being held on criminal charges… the standard should be higher for
this detention facility.”
A central concern is the center’s policy requiring attorneys to call ahead before mailing legal documents, Godshall said. If the center is not notified in advance, the mail is returned. According to Godshall, this policy is not published on Baker County’s website or in other public resources, putting attorneys and their clients at a significant disadvantage.
Godshall also alleged when legal mail does arrive, it is opened outside the detainee’s presence, a violation of attorney-client privilege. The lawsuit, filed in fall 2022, remains in the discovery phase, she said.
“Baker is responsible for providing food and medical care and clothing and housing, and all of those needs,” Godshall said. “Access to counsel is a big need for people in ICE detention, and they’re failing in all of those regards.”
From alleged spoiled food and moldy showers to shared dirty uniforms and underwear, the stories Godshall has heard paint a grim picture.
“People always talk about how they find bugs in it,” she said of the food. “It’s really bad. Every aspect of life in ICE detention is horrific.”
Godshall said officers at Baker have used pepper spray in response to detainees’ refusal to eat what they believed was spoiled food and have directed racial slurs and demeaning behavior toward those in custody.
“No one should, regardless of how you feel about ICE detention, be subjected to this,” she said. “I think it’s a waste of our government resources, and I think it’s led to unnecessary and avoidable abuse.”
@veralupap vpappaterra@alligator.org
UF women in STEM code to close the gender gap
By Michael Angee Alligator Staff Writer
When Aparna Sai Nimmagadda looks around the discussion section in her Operating Systems course, the 21-year-old computer science senior sees only five women among her 30 classmates. At UF, that’s a common experience for women in the STEM field.
Women made up about 30% of College of Engineering graduates in the 2023-2024 academic year, according to the most recent data from UF Institutional Planning and Research. In comparison, 57% of total degree recipients across the university that year were women.
The gender gap can lead to women “not feeling at home” in their major, Nimmagadda said.
That’s why she’s part of Girls Who Code, one of the many campus organizations geared toward promoting community and career development for women in STEM fields at UF.
Nimmagadda joined Girls Who Code as a business major in her sophomore year and soon switched to computer science as her interest in the field grew. Being in the club allowed her to be part of a supportive engineering community of women before joining the major.
“I had already organically made those relationships, so asking for help was very easy, whether that was choosing my classes or also
the assignments themselves as well,” Nimmagadda said.
Nimmagadda, now president of Girls Who Code, said the group and others like it can help make women studying STEM fields at UF feel more at home in their careers by creating a space where women in engineering can meet each other outside of the male-dominated classrooms and formal networking events.
“I think Girls Who Code focuses on bridging that gap through giving space to students on campus to make those relationships, because a lot of relationships aren’t made in the classroom. They’re made outside of it,” Nimmagadda said.
UF’s Society of Women Engineers
The gender gap isn’t unique to computer science. In the 2023-2024 academic year, about 17% of mechanical engineering degree recipients were women.
UF’s chapter of the Society of Women Engineers aims to address this imbalance through outreach and mentoring programs. The group focuses on educating young girls about engineering from an early age, hoping to shift the gender gap over time.
Lili Lusvardi, one of the chapter’s social chairs, said exposing young women and elementary school-level students to engineering can help reduce the gender gap in the field.
“I think that’s going to take years to accomplish and I think for the time being it's nice to
congregate as engineers who are women,” said Lusvardi, a 20-year-old computer engineering sophomore.
Lusvardi said UF SWE created a tutorial for elementary-level girls to learn scratch coding language. Scratch is a block coding language used to teach children coding, which SWE used during one of its outreach events.
By 2023, 16.7% of individuals working in engineering and architecture were women, compared to the 9% of women in these fields in the 1990s, according to the Society of Women Engineers website. Female representation in these fields varied, with women making up 26.9% of those working in computer and mathematical occupations and 55% of those in biological sciences. SWE also establishes mentors and events for women in engineering to aid the process of finding jobs after graduation, said treasurer Zoe Szczesniak, a 19-yearold mechanical engineering sophomore. The annual SWE conference also puts women in contact with engineering companies that are looking specifically for women.
According to Szczesniak, multiple members of SWE UF have received job and internship offers due to the annual job fair -– most recently, two internships at Honeywell and one prize from Capital One.
“It’s bigger than UF’s career fair and specifically targeted towards women in engineering,” Szczesniak said. “You know the people there
are looking for someone in your demographic regardless.”
WiNGHacks
Annual events like WiNGHacks also build community for women and nonbinary students interested in computer science and engineering. The event is a yearly hackathon with an emphasis on women and nonbinary students, bridging the gap of experience needed to enter fields in computer science and engineering.
The event tasks students with developing a computer software within a two day deadline. At this year’s hackathon in February, the winning team created a software called “Plan Your Care,” which helps people find the nearest abortion clinic and provides them with information about abortion depending on their state.
WiNGHacks co-director Valentina Esteban, a 20-year-old computer science junior, said the difference in the amount of men versus women in her classes is increasingly apparent as she progresses in her degree. Having a space like WiNGHacks provides comfort for women and nonbinary students to be a part of something that is typically male-dominated, she said.
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@michaelangee mangee@alligator.org
Del Halter // Alligator Staff
Inmates at Baker County Detention Center have filed numerous complaints about their living conditions.
The future of Florida and education: Students, residents and educators weigh in
PRESIDENT
DONALD TRUMP SIGNED AN EXECUTIVE ORDER TO DISMANTLE THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
By Vivienne Serret Alligator Staff Writer
When Andrew Spar was in first grade, he couldn’t read.
Though he struggled in school, the educators in his life were determined to make him succeed. In 1994, Spar graduated from Ohio State University. That same year, he moved to Daytona Beach and became a music teacher at Turie T. Small Elementary School.
Now, Spar serves as president of the Florida Education Association, a non-partisan union representing educators in Florida from pre-K–12 schools, and all of Florida’s universities and colleges.
“There are so many teachers that I can go on and on about who had an impact on me,” Spar said. “And I think that’s true with most educators. There’s just someone who really inspired them.”
Through organizations like the FEA, educators and union members advocate for high quality, free public education, and also advocate for educators so they can adequately do their job without interference, Spar said.
But with the Trump administration calling for the dismantling of the Department of Education and Florida’s teachers still struggling to make livable wages, Spar said the future of educators and student proficiency is uncertain.
“We don’t need to eliminate the Department of Education. We don’t need to underfund our schools. We don’t even need to divert dollars away from our schools,” Spar said. “We need to invest and support the amazing work that happens in our public schools every day so that every child experiences what they need to be successful lifelong learners.”
Florida’s policies
In a Wall Street Journal opinion piece
submitted by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, he wrote President Donald Trump was “doing what other Republicans have promised, but failed, to do.” The governor said Florida has “led the charge to pursue student-focused, parent-friendly education policies” and overturn previous policies from the Obama and Biden administrations.
“We abolished Common Core, which had been pushed by the Obama administration, because it didn’t work for our students,” DeSantis wrote in the op-ed. “Florida replaced it with high-quality, content-rich standards.”
Common Core, a set of academic standards in subjects like English and math in K-12 education, was abolished in 2020.
At a press conference in February, DeSantis announced a proposal for a record high increase of $1.5 billion for teacher pay and an additional $1.76 billion for early childhood education. The proposal maintains Florida’s low college tuition.
But educators within the FEA argue the proposed budget fails to support students and still undermines the livable wages necessary to live comfortably in the Sunshine State.
“When you think about inflation and the fact that it costs so much more today than it did in 2010 to pay your bills, to buy groceries,” Spar said. “To meet the needs of your family, then you realize that there’s a problem here.”
Florida ranks 50th in the nation for average teacher salary, according to the National Education Association. The average teacher salary in the nation is nearly $70,000, but Florida’s average sits at about $53,000.
Spar said DeSantis has not truly invested in public education or teacher salaries. Instead, he diverted dollars to “beginning teacher pay” at the expense of teachers with experience, which has only aggravated the teacher and staff shortage, Spar said.
Though DeSantis’ time as Florida’s governor will come to a close January 2027, his policies and education model have stuck with many nationwide.
Craig Anderson, a 26-year-old political educator and conservative podcast host, said the removal of DEI departments and bills like the “Stop Woke Act” have been a positive addition to combatting left-wing propaganda.
In regard to budget increases for education, Anderson said DeSantis gave a sizable raise to teachers to attract talent in Florida, and bureaucracy in education in general has significantly grown.
Not every administrative and bureaucratic position in the school system is needed, Anderson said, and eliminating those positions at the local level could increase teacher pay.
Anderson said dismantling the DOE has been on “the conservative wish list for the last 50 years.”
“The Department of Education was ultimately another tool of the left to fulfill its political agenda, rather than serve students,” Anderson said.
For the 2022-2023 school year, the Florida Department of Education reported 4,440 unfilled positions — the highest among all states who had reported vacancies that year. Similarly, Florida reported 9.3% of classes were taught by teachers who were not appropriately qualified based on state requirements.
But Florida wants to do something different than liberal groups when it comes to education, such as taking power away from a centralized government and funding education within the state, said Raemi Eagle-Glenn, the state committeewoman for the Alachua County Republicans.
In February, The Florida Department of Education’s Charter School Review Commission approved Newberry Elementary School to become a public charter school beginning in the 2026–2027 school year. Eagle-Glenn said she was happy with the decision because parents were “very fed up.”
By returning power back to the states, she said, ideological indoctrination will not be as prevalent in schools locally.
“I like what I see with members of communities coming together, rising up, moving
away from the public school boards,” EagleGlenn said. “Moving away from the influence of the teachers unions, and creating their own local education systems.”
But for others like David Arreola, a former Gainesville city commissioner who’s worked closely with his school board, the conversion of schools like Newberry Elementary is a destructive example of how conservatives want total control of what’s taught in schools.
Within the next several years, Arreola said he anticipates Florida will be a much more accelerated version of current conservative policies. With the 2026 governors election, he said, much is at stake.
“[I see Florida] completely getting rid of public education, I could see the state university system becoming a simple mouthpiece for conservative politicians,” Arreola said. “You already see the trend of placing failed Republican politicians into presidential roles at colleges and universities, where they enact a political agenda.”
Upon asking the governor’s office for an interview, The Alligator was redirected to the Feb. 14 press conference.
Federal policy changes
On March 20, Trump signed an executive order to dismantle the DOE, which is in charge of the country’s national education policy. The DOE was established in 1979 under former President Jimmy Carter, and it oversees national education policy and administers federal assistance programs for schools across the country.
The DOE manages a budget of approximately $268 billion, which was about 4% of U.S. federal spending in the fiscal year 2024. The Department of Health and Human Services, which is now overseen by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., was first on the list of highest federal spending.
Read the rest online at alligator.org.
@vivienneserret vserret@alligator.org
Gainesville Police Department understaffing puts strain on residents’ faith
GPD’S OFFICERS TO CITIZENS RATIO FALLS BELOW THE NATIONAL AND STATE AVERAGES
By Kaysheri Haffner Alligator Staff Writer
When Ruth Hanford spotted a strange woman drinking alcohol in her yard, she rushed to dial 911. She was used to unhoused people wandering near her home in downtown Gainesville, but after being attacked in the past, she didn’t want to take any chances.
By the time Gainesville Police Department officers arrived almost two hours later, 45-year-old Hanford said her fears were realized, and the woman had attacked her.
“She hit me so hard a crown came out of my tooth,” Hanford said.
According to data from the FBI Crime Data Explorer, GPD had two employees per 1,000 Gainesville residents in 2023, which is below both the nationwide and state average of 3.5. The ideal number of law enforcement officers to cover the Gainesville area is around 300. Currently, GPD has about 285 officers.
It wasn’t Hanford’s only encounter with police in the past year, and her experiences with officers have varied greatly. While it took offi-
cers almost a full two hours to reach her in May, she said assistance was much faster when a man broke into her home a few months before, even though the 911 operator hung up on her and she had to call again.
“Ultimately, the cops that showed up for that did show up in a timely like manner,” she said. “I want to say that those were three of the best cops I’ve ever dealt with in the Gainesville Police Department, and they were able to solve it.”
Hanford called her street a “Bermuda Triangle” of crime, where she’s seen alleged drug dealings and prostitution outside her window. While it’s improved in the past few months, she said there’s always an ebb and flow.
“I don’t feel like I can walk around in my own neighborhood safely,” she said. “I don’t have any faith that if something were to happen and I were to call, that they [GPD] would show up in any sort of meaningful sort of way. I have no faith that 911 can do their job.”
Some GPD officers have been wonderful, Hanford said, but others gave her a very different impression. Her neighborhood has requested extra patrols in response to the high crime, but it only happens intermittently, she said.
“The song and dance I get from every Gainesville Police Department
[officer] [is], ‘Oh, well, there’s only eight or 10 of us,’ so they’ve been very clear that they’re very shortstaffed,” she said.
GPD has more sworn officers this year than it has the past several years, with only 16 vacancies, Sgt. Shelly Postal said.
Since the recent improvement in staff levels, Postal said GPD has seen improvements in response time to reported crimes. Despite the vacancies, all zones in Gainesville are covered with at least one officer, she said.
“If we were 100% staffed, some of those zones… may be staffed with two or three officers rather than just one,” she said.
The number of law enforcement officers at GPD has dropped steadily from 2020 to 2023, with a 16% decrease in personnel over the fouryear period, according to data from the FBI Crime Data Explorer.
Civilian employees, which include full-time agency personnel like clerks, radio dispatchers, meter attendants, stenographers, jailers, correctional officers and mechanics, dropped more slowly at a 13% decrease, bringing GPD’s total employees from 367 to 311 from 2020 to 2023.
GPD has also seen a decrease in employees due to officer retention, which is often due to officers retiring after spending a full 25 years on
the force, Postal said — 2024 was the first year GPD had more new hires than retirements.
While GPD does deal with vacancies, it doesn’t affect the IT staff and 911 operators sorting through calls, Postal said. Operators organize calls based on priority for officer response.
“Some people can become a little bit upset about that depending on what the situation is,” she said. “But anything that’s high-priority, we’re going to obviously go to immediately.”
Higher-priority reports include medical emergencies, armed disturbances and anyone in immediate distress, she said.
However, 38-year-old Brittany, who requested to keep her last name omitted in fear of retaliation from GPD, said her experiences with the agency in emergency situations has been wildly different.
Brittany, who works as a nurse at UF Health Shands Hospital, said she’s dealt with violent patients attacking hospital staff over her years working in healthcare. In an incident about four years ago, a patient caused significant damage to another person, she said, but GPD officers refused to arrest him.
The dismissiveness she’s received from GPD about incidents scares her, Brittany said, especially when
threats from violent patients aren’t uncommon.
“They’ll look you dead in the eye and say, ‘If I ever see you outside of here, I’m going to kill you,’” she said. Brittany has also had encounters with GPD in her personal life, which left her unsatisfied, she said. Her former partner ran over her foot with his truck about four years ago, and despite his criminal history, she said nothing ever came of the report.
The officer who assisted her said her foot looked fine and drove off without getting details about the incident from her, she said. The officers did nothing to help her, even when she called to follow up on the incident, she said.
The lack of responsiveness is also common when healthcare workers are attacked, she said. Nothing usually comes of the reports she and her coworkers make to the police.
She understands the department is short-staffed, and said low staffing is also a frequent problem in hospitals. However, Brittany said it doesn’t excuse the dismissiveness she’s seen on many occasions.
“We need to have law and order to keep things going,” she said. “That’s not the feeling anybody gets from GPD, at times.”
@kaysheri_h khaffner@alligator.org
MONDAY, MARCH 24, 2025
www.alligator.org/section/the_avenue
THEATRE
From The Swamp to the Concrete Jungle, one UF musical theatre student makes his Broadway debut
TREVOR WAYNE TALKS
JOINING THE ORIGINAL BROADWAY CAST OF “THE OUTSIDERS”
By Tanya Fedak Avenue Staff Writer
When Trevor Wayne first picked up his worn-out copy of S.E. Hinton’s novel “The Outsiders” in seventh grade and began to read the opening lines, it became more than just an assignment. Even though he was sitting in an English classroom in Boca Raton, Florida, he saw himself in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He saw himself in the characters who came to life before him, both Greasers and Socs alike.
Most people know “The Outsiders” as nothing more than a book they were required to read in middle school English class — a tattered paperback with a creased spine and stained pages from years of students coming before. For many, the story of identity, friendship and inherent class division was no more than a homework assignment.
But for Wayne, it was more than just words on a page — these were imperfect people who made it easy to relate to as they fought to belong. In that English classroom, he had no idea one day he would be standing on a Broadway stage, bringing the characters he resonated so deeply with to life.
The 27-year-old made his Broadway debut in “The Outsiders” in April as the understudy for the protagonist, Ponyboy Curtis. The show, which won the 2024 Tony Award for Best Musical, opened on a Saturday, and Wayne made his debut the next Tuesday without ever having run the show in rehearsals.
Since then, his new normal has become a whirlwind of last-minute call times and globally broadcasted performances.
Becoming the character
For most, being part of one of the biggest Broadway sensations of the season would be enough pressure alone, but it isn’t the fan accounts or crowds of screaming supporters waiting outside the theater that weigh heaviest on him. It’s the determination to fulfill the “Great Expectations” of fans who grew up alongside Ponyboy, forging their own connections and interpretations of the character and the story.
“Everyone’s felt like an outsider at one point,” he said. “I think that’s the biggest challenge — staying true and doing that part justice when you know in the back of your mind
that there were 500 people or more in that audience that fully relate to Pony, and Pony means so much to them and this story means so much to them.”
Wayne is one of the three actors who cover the show’s leading character, joining Brody Grant and Josh Strobl in bringing him to life. Despite all receiving identical scripts, blocking, musical scores and everything in between, watching each actor as Ponyboy is like witnessing a completely different production. The dynamic shifts between each performance, which Wayne said the three of them aimed to do.
When it came to deciding how they should play the role, Wayne said the process centered around the three actors each discovering the overarching theme they wanted to predominate their character. He said whereas Grant plays him as rebellious, physical and emotive, Strobl prioritizes Ponyboy having his heart on his sleeve, tapping into the emotional side. Wayne brings a rawness and vulnerability to the role, and he said he’s been told his interpretation is a quieter and more reserved version.
“My Pony will fake as much as Paul Newman as he wants to be, as much as Cool Hand Luke as he wants to be,” Wayne said. “Every now and then when he’s comfortable, he’s sensitive and this shy and this quietly aware aura will kind of shine through.”
Getting to Tulsa
Wayne’s schedule as Ponyboy is often unpredictable, but when he’s not on stage, he sits in a vocal booth backstage where he and three others will sing in the show’s ensemble. Although he’s still called for each performance, Wayne — who’s affectionately referred to by the cast as “Trevi” — said being isolated from the rest of the cast was something he initially struggled with.
“When everyone kept talking about family and how much the show meant to them and how much each other meant to them, we just felt super isolated,” he said. “We were like, ‘OK, so this isn’t our show. This is their show, and we’re helping out.’”
But as the show’s run progressed, Wayne and his fellow understudies were getting to see more opportunities to abandon the booth and join the cast onstage, building their personal and professional connections.
Wayne’s journey to get to the east side of Tulsa was an unorthodox mix of auditioning and pure luck. After one of his classmates at UF gave up his spot to sing for the tour director
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of “Dear Evan Hansen” to Wayne, he received a life-changing phone call almost a year and half later asking him to cover Ponyboy after Brody Grant was injured during the show’s pre-Broadway run.
Within 24 hours, he was at the Orlando airport, ready to bring the story to life. He joined the rest of the cast about three weeks into the rehearsal process, but he caught up well before the show’s final performance in California on April 9, 2023. But even as the curtain went down, the show wasn’t over yet.
Sitting in the audience of one of the shows was Angelina Jolie and her daughter, Vivienne. The mother-daughter-duo was inspired by the show, and after meeting with the musical’s director, Danya Taymor, Jolie signed on to be a producer and bring “The Outsiders” to Broadway, ultimately earning four Tony awards, including Best Musical.
Balancing gratitude and boundaries
Around Wayne’s dressing room are a number of different drawings and letters scattered around. Some are taped on the walls, and some are just laying on the counter after recently being opened.
Getting letters and gifts from fans isn’t uncommon for Wayne, and the growing amount he receives makes it difficult for him to write back. When paired with the amount of messages he gets online, it’s too much to reply to them all. However, he said he’ll always make time to read every one.
After the curtain closes at the end of each show, Wayne faces yet an-
other level of attention -– the stage door, where fans will crowd after the show, pushing each other up against the barricade in an excited attempt to get their Playbills signed by the actors.
At first, adapting to the high-energy environment was difficult, but as Wayne started to watch his castmates navigate the post-show chaos, he learned to maintain his composure while navigating what some of the fans are expecting from these interactions.
“It’s the passionate ones that maybe feel like, because they’ve come to the show a lot, they feel like they have the right to [say] ‘Well, they’re my friends now,’” he said. “It’s like, we are. We love y’all, but I don’t know you. Just because you come to the show a lot doesn’t mean I know you. It’s tough.”
While the enthusiastic fans are eager to show their support for both Wayne and the production, there are some theater-goers who take it a step above just wanting an autograph. Wayne said there’s been occasions when audience members gave him their phone numbers or invited him out for drinks, but it’s too much of a weird dynamic to ever come to fruition.
Even with the sometimes overwhelming displays of affection, Wayne made a commitment to himself to always stagedoor. Growing up, he’d also wait outside after a show and hope a certain cast member would come out, and when they would, he would freak out.
“I know what that’s like, and I
know it’s not required for us to be there at the stage door, but I’m gonna do it,” he said. “I’m not on every day, you know? It’s the least I can do for the fans to see what’s up, and it’s always a good experience.”
Unpredictability becomes normality
With only three hours until a performance on Dec. 23 is set to begin, Wayne still doesn’t know if he’ll be playing Ponyboy for the 7 p.m. show. He occasionally checks his phone, waiting for any word on if it’ll be him or Grant. Most days he’ll get notice he’s expected to perform the morning of, but sometimes it can be the moments leading up to the show. Once, he found out only an hour before the curtain was scheduled to rise.
This unpredictability has become part of the norm for “The Outsiders” — a show that’s been heavily dependent on its understudies and “swings,” who understudy multiple roles. With the principal actors often getting sick or calling off to take a well-deserved break from the stage, understudies have become a backbone for the company as they step in at only a moment’s notice to ensure the story of Greasers and Socs can be told.
Some nights, there are so many actors calling off that there aren’t enough understudies to cover them. When this happens, some actors will have to do a split track, which means someone has to play one character in one scene and then another in the next. Sometimes they’ll play two characters in one scene.
The adaptability that comes with bringing this iconic role to life is just one of the many things Wayne has learned from his almost year-long journey with the musical and even longer journey with the story. In between the quick costume changes, adrenaline-filled dances and quick turnarounds, Wayne still finds himself stopping and re-realizing just how far he’s made it.
“I am extremely thankful and blessed,” he says about making it on Broadway. “I thank God every day. It’s every single day that matters.”
It’s been a year of discovery, both professionally and personally, as he embarks on a journey of learning how to step into someone else’s shoes, making their struggles and triumphs his own in front of audiences of up to 1,000 people. And as the final notes of “The Outsiders” echo through the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre, Wayne knows his journey isn’t over just yet. It’s only just begun.
@ttanyafedak tfedak@alligator.org
Tanya Fedak // Alligator Staff
Trevor Wayne gazes at a collection of playbills in his dressing room at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre in New York, New York on Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024.
Caimán
A local food truck finds its niche in serving classic New Orleans beignets
LE PETITE BEIGNET HAS SERVED OVER 10,000 BEIGNETS TO CUSTOMERS IN THE GAINESVILLE AREA
By Corey Fiske Avenue Staff Writer
A warm, sweet aroma fills the air as customers take bites into fresh, hot beignets with an airy melt-in-your-mouth dough. Le Petite Beignet owners Michael and Michiyo Johnson go through 70 pounds of powdered sugar each month to give each hot treat a sweet flourish on top.
The Johnsons had their first date at One Love Cafe in Gainesville, and Michael said he instantly thought, “This is my person.” They married in November 2023.
Michiyo Johnson, a 48-year-old retired chiropractor, dreamed of opening a doughnut truck with crazy flavors. Soon afterward, doughnut trucks like Halo Potato Donuts ended up becoming more common. Although she already had a name picked out — “Damn Good Donuts” — the increasing commonality caused her to switch gears.
“You couldn’t throw a rock without hitting a doughnut truck,” Michael said.
The pair opened Le Petite Beignet in June out of a small trailer attached to their silver Jeep Wrangler. Not even a year later, the Johnsons sold their 10,000th beignet this spring.
Neither came from New Orleans, the home of the famous Cafe du Monde beignets, though they visited separately before they were together. The closest thing they have to a culinary background is Michiyo Johnson’s father, who owned Japanese restaurants in California, where she grew up.
The Johnsons came up with their unique recipe for beignet dough and began using the kitchen at Working Food, which is a nonprofit kitchen used by over 40 food trucks and businesses.
The couple pulled into the Working Food parking lot just after 7 p.m. Feb. 26 to unload ingredients and prepare beignet dough. Flood lights barely illuminated the building’s exterior, casting an eerie glow. The Johnsons would rather make the dough in the daytime, but competition over the schedule at
SMALL BUSINESSES
Working Food means they sometimes get stuck with the late shift.
The process of dough making begins with “mise en place” — or putting everything in its place. They raise the air conditioning to a stifling 80 degrees so the dough rises properly.
Michael Johnson set out 10 metal bowls alongside two silver KitchenAid stand mixers. It was their first night with a second mixer, and they were excited to see how much it would speed up their dough-making.
Michael Johnson added yeast to the bowls as they started
to prepare 10 batches of dough. They each know the recipe by heart and worked together in sync. They experimented with half a dozen different recipes to create what they consider the perfect beignet, but the menu is still expanding.
In the fall, they sold pumpkin spice beignets. Now, they have new takes on beignets, like jalapeño cheddar, rosemary sea salt and chive with cream cheese. To minimize food waste in the cutting stage, the Johnsons began to sell beignet bites out of the excess dough. Le Petite Beignet also sells coffee and hot chocolate, as well as their hybrid hot chocolate coffee.
Michael Johnson chopped blocks of butter into large, square pads, melting just the right amount for each batch of dough. Michiyo cracked eggs against the metal countertop. Despite rising egg costs, the Johnsons haven’t raised prices.
The Johnsons make dough about three times each month. The dough can sit in the freezer for up to four weeks, but they usually have used it up long before.
“How many hours do you think we spend in this kitchen?” Michael Johnson asked.
“Oh, God,” his wife said.
“Too many,” Michael Johnson responded.
Michael Johnson moved each batch to the stand mixers one by one. The whirring motors drowned out the sound of Billy Joel’s “Uptown Girl” playing from Michiyo Johnson’s phone.
So far, the Johnsons’ business has been going well. At the AUK Market’s Book and Art Faire in August, they had a nonstop 20-person line. Despite being 30 minutes behind due to an issue with their propane tank, they managed to sell 550 beignets in four hours, making it their best-selling day yet. They typically sell around 300.
Figuring out the right number of beignets to bring to each event is a delicate decision. On days they have leftover dough, which can’t be refrozen, they sometimes fry up the extra beignets and bring them to fire stations or to St. Francis House, which serves people experiencing homelessness.
Read the rest online at alligator.org/ section/the_avenue.
@coreyfiske7 cfiske@alligator.org
Female-owned businesses to visit around Gainesville
THREE FEMALE BUSINESS OWNERS REFLECT ON OPENING THEIR BUSINESSES
By Juliana DeFilippo Avenue Staff Writer
In Gainesville’s ever-changing business environment, it can be hard to thrive as a female small-business owner. Some struggle to be taken seriously as they navigate business ownership or find their vulnerability exploited.
During Women’s History Month, three female business owners discussed how they started and maintained their businesses in lieu of these struggles. As they have learned over the years, being a female business owner can have its advantages and disadvantages.
Happy Kiss Pole Dance
Before she opened Happy Kiss Pole Dance studio at 501 NW 23 Ave., 39-year-old Johanna Monserratte taught classes out of a 250-squarefoot room in her house. Nervous people would think they had the wrong address, but Monserratte sat by her window to welcome her students. With only two poles set up in the house, she could teach only three or four students at a time.
As time went on, Monserratte started to expand her customer base, and when she opened her studio in March of 2014, her students helped her tear down walls and install poles.
“It was this really vibrant, full-of-energy time and lots of excitement,” she said. “It was definitely a community endeavor — definitely not just me making all that happen.”
Because the studio operates on a subscription model, Monserratte often gets to know her customers. As the owner, she has taken on more administrative duties, but her favorite part of her job has always been teaching.
She loves seeing a student’s “light bulb moment” when they finally get a new move or trick, but she said she especially enjoys seeing how those she teaches learn they are stronger than they know.
While Monserratte is quick to drop a “corny joke” as a teacher, she often feels it’s hard for her to be taken seriously as a business owner. It’s easy for people to take advantage of the “softness and vulnerability” people attribute to her because she is a woman, she said.
When she’s overwhelmed, she finds she can turn to a community of women for support. In the past, she was part of a coaching group for other pole dance studio owners. With her group, she discussed how to set and meet goals and attract clients to her business. While she said she feels grateful for the ability to run her own business, she still thinks it’s important to “commiserate” with fellow female business owners.
“It’s nice to have a circle of people that you can say ‘This sh*t just sucks sometimes,’” she said.
Wildflowers: A Yoga + Healing Collective
From her first-ever yoga class at the YMCA at age 16, Brandi Sadler was hooked. Throughout her early 20s, she continued to practice yoga and finally completed a 200 hour training to become an instructor in 2009.
Now, at 39 years old, she is the owner of Wildflowers: A Yoga + Healing Collective,
her very own yoga studio located at 205 NW 10th Ave. After opening the studio in August 2019, Sadler was able to operate for only a few months before moving to a virtual format due to COVID-19. During the pandemic, she used GoFundMe to keep the studio running and found the community of students she built were willing to support her.
Her biggest goal in opening the studio was increasing the accessibility of yoga. She feels Western yoga studios place too much emphasis on the asanas, or physical postures of yoga, rather than the life practices, she said.
“The postures have become such a mainstream aspect where people are like, ‘I’m bad at yoga, because I can’t touch my toes,’” Sadler said. “But actually, the postures are such a small piece of it. It’s actually the philosophy and the mentality around it all.”
Wildflowers emphasizes the 8 Limbs of Yoga, a specific method that pays attention to eight facets of yoga, including external principles, or yamas, and internal standards, or niyamas, as well as postures and breathwork. Sadler said she finds this approach to yoga challenges the way many people think about it, and she enjoys watching as her students learn about the different components that go into the practice of yoga.
Part of teaching the 8 Limbs of Yoga means her students implement practices into their own lives. During philosophy talks, members can ask questions about how to apply and better understand these practices, creating an environment of accountability. She feels this accountability reflects her values as a female business owner, she said.
“That’s something that feels like a very motherly thing — this softer but stern energy of the feminine that’s very at play here,” she said. “People feel supported and held but want to be held accountable at the same time.”
Last year, she added “Healing Collective” to the studio’s title to emphasize its range of offerings, including ceremonies and sound baths. The studio offers beginners three weeks of unlimited yoga for $30. They also host donation classes, where proceeds go to other organizations, including charities in Gainesville.
Black C Art
Ani Collier has been an artist her entire life, studying ballet in Sofia, Bulgaria, before moving to the US in 1990. After growing up with American media like movies and magazines, she still experienced a culture shock when she arrived.
“I never thought that the world would change so drastically and that I would ever go to America,” she said. “In my lifetime, it was almost as impossible as going to the moon.”
She continued her art career in the United States and Europe as a dance photographer, choreographer and filmmaker. She is also the owner of Black C Art Gallery, which Collier described as both a studio and a gallery. Located at 201 SE 2nd Place, the name is a reference to the Black Sea, which borders Bulgaria.
Read the rest online at alligator.org/ section/the_avenue.
@JulianaDeF58101 jdefillipo@alligator.org
Corey Fiske // Alligator Staff
Michael and Michiyo Johnson prepare the beignet dough at Working Food on Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2025.
www.alligator.org/section/opinions
How men can support women during Women’s History Month (and year-round)
March is here, and with it comes Women’s History Month — a time to honor the achievements of women while acknowledging the challenges they still face. While progress over the years has chipped away at gender inequities, there’s still one glaring gap: the need for male advocates.
Women’s equality has taken large strides since the movement’s beginning in 1848. For example, U.S. women now represent 51% of the college-educated workforce among adults aged 25 and older, surpassing men at 49%, according to the Pew Research Center.
Despite this progress, gender disparities persist in leadership roles, pay equity and societal expectations. Beyond economics, women still face challenges like being overlooked or underestimated in male-dominated fields. This is when male advocacy becomes pivotal.
Evan Wall, a 21-year-old UF education senior, said he actively supports women’s equality daily, even when other men fail to do so.
“There are always so many jokes surrounding the capabilities of women,” he said. “I think many of the problems that women face, the vast majority of guys think it is not their problem, so they do not need to do anything.”
Wall’s perspective underscores the crucial role men can play in addressing gender inequities. The issue is that men who want to contribute don’t know where to start.
Here are three impactful ways men can actively chip in during Women’s History Month: advocate for and amplify women’s voices, challenge gender bias, and educate themselves and others on gender equity.
To amplify women’s voices, men can support them by sharing their achievements, ideas and stories. This could mean promoting women-led projects, recommending their work or simply acknowledging their contributions in personal and professional spaces.
What it means to challenge gender bias is
to address and question stereotypes or biases you notice in conversations, media or workplaces. Small actions, like stopping harmful comments, can create meaningful change.
Isis Snow opinions@alligator.org
When educating yourself on gender equality, take the time to learn about the challenges women face and share that knowledge. Support initiatives and policies promoting gender equity — not just in March, but year-round.
“In an ideal world where there is gender equity, women would have the same jobs men do, and women can even walk the streets at night and not be afraid about what a man says or does,” Wall said.
Why not chase this ideal? Creating a future where gender equality thrives requires effort from everyone. Coming up with small goals to commit to this month to promote gender equality is one sure way to contribute.
Dominic Ho, a 20-year-old UF pre-law junior, said gender equality is an important topic, and he is dedicated to advancing gender equity through small, meaningful actions in his daily life.
“One thing that I could commit to doing this month to support gender equality is to ensure that women, whether at work or in a social setting, are able to feel safe around other people,” he said.
As Women’s History Month continues, let’s not only celebrate the achievements of women, but also commit to the work that still needs to be done. Gender equity is not a distant dream — it’s a shared responsibility.
The question remains: What will you do to make a difference — not just this month, but every day?
Isis Snow is a UF journalism and sports media junior.
Endangered and ignored: the Florida panther
The Florida panther, native to southwest Florida and a keystone species in its ecosystem, has been critically endangered since 1973. The species is listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, but the act’s conservation efforts have not been enough to protect the species from its major threats, mainly due to legislation aiming to weaken the act.
Threats to the Florida panther, primarily car collisions and habitat destruction, stem from the increasing urban sprawl and car-centric culture of Florida and the U.S., especially within previously natural spaces.
The latest panther death, occurring on March 10, is the second in March and the fourth of this year so far, pushing the population to a critical position.
Florida panthers, along with many other native endangered species like the gopher tortoise and the red-cockaded woodpecker, rely on Florida State Parks and similar entities for this protection and advocacy.
However, these spaces are some of the Trump administration’s most recent targets for federal funding cuts, and could face challenges in providing some of the same services as they used to. The cuts have added endangered animals to the lengthy list of our oligarch’s enemies.
With the recent nomination of former Wyoming Game and Fish Director Brian Nevsik for Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, whose accolades include weakening the Endangered Species Act and prioritizing profit over wildlife, the Florida panther, alongside other endangered species, could face more risk or not survive the current administration at all.
Species lacking protection or whose protections came too late, such as Florida’s dusky seaside sparrow, have gone extinct, affecting its ecosystem’s productivity tremendously.
Even with the administration continuously undermining previous conservation policies such as the Endangered Species Act, Floridians can still take action to pass promising legislation relating to threatened species and the protection of our natural spaces.
One of these proposed policies is Senate Bill 80, a bill attempting to combat Gov. Ron DeSantis’ agenda to transform Florida into a resort with a price of admission. Known as the “State Park Preservation Act,” the bill would require public hearings for any changes to Florida’s State Parks and conservation or nonconservation land management plans, aiming to stop the development of golf courses, pickleball courts and other properties on state park land.
Along with stopping developers from privatizing public land, the proposed bill allows for state parks to continue protecting the habitats of Florida’s endangered species such as the Florida panther. Since the bill was just introduced to the senate floor on March 4, Florida voters can still take measures to ensure their representatives speak for the will of their constituents — not their financial backers
These actions include emailing and calling your senator urging them to support the bill with a personalized, concise message and following up later to begin a productive dialogue with those making decisions that affect you and your fellow Floridians. With these actions, we can change the future of our native endangered animals and act to protect the parks and habitats of endangered species.
Gracie Adams is a UF environmental science freshman.
The views expressed here are not necessarily those of The Alligator.
The Alligator encourages comments from readers. Letters to the editor should not exceed 600 words (about one letter-sized page). They must be typed, double-spaced and must include the author’s name, classification and phone number. Names will be withheld if the writer shows just cause. We reserve the right to edit for length, grammar, style and libel. Send letters to opinions@alligator.org, bring them to 2700 SW 13th St., or send them to P.O. Box 14257, Gainesville, FL 32604-2257. Columns of about 450 words about original topics and editorial cartoons are also welcome. Questions? Call 352-376-4458.
Gracie Adams opinions@alligator.org
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6. TELEVISION: Which city is the setting for the dramatic series "The Wire"?
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7. GEOLOGY: Which country has the most active volcanos?
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1. 63,360 inches
5. What was the name of the turbojet-powered vehicle that driver/designer Art Arfons used to claim the land speed record three times from 1964-65?
2. Search for extraterrestrial intelligence
6. What Soviet/Russian figure skater, along with husband Sergei Grinkov, won gold medals in the pairs event at the 1988 Calgary and 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics?
3. Below or insufficient
7. Businesswoman and philanthropist Joan Whitney Payson was co-founder and served as president 1. Tommie
Los detenidos alegan abuso y aislamiento en el Centro de Detención del Condado de Baker
LAS DENUNCIAS PRESENTADAS
MUESTRAN FALTA DE ATENCIÓN MÉDICA Y CONDICIONES INSALUBRES
Por Vera Lucia Pappaterra Escritora de El Caimán
Traducido por Avery Parker Escritor de El Caimán
Temperaturas bajo cero, ropa sucia y escasa atención médica son algunas de las realidades diarias reportadas por los detenidos dentro del Centro de Detención del Condado de Baker.
El Centro de Detención de Inmigración y Control de Seguridad de los Estados Unidos en Macclenny, a unos 50 minutos al norte de Gainesville, es una de las cuatro instalaciones en Florida que alberga a inmigrantes indocumentados. Sin embargo, según los defensores y las quejas presentadas, la instalación de Baker también es el lugar de abuso y negligencia.
El centro de Baker ha recibido 259 quejas desde 2017, lo que representa más de la mitad del total de 470 en los cuatro centros de detención del estado.
Alice Gridley dirige Baker Interfaith Friends, un grupo que visita el centro de detención y ofrece apoyo a las personas detenidas y a sus familias que se quedan atrás. Gran parte del trabajo de Gridley involucra hablar con los detenidos, ofreciendo apoyo y alivio momentáneo del presunto abuso continuo en el centro de detención.
Ella y otros voluntarios tratan de cerrar la brecha para los detenidos, haciendo llamadas telefónicas a sus seres queridos. Muchas veces, lo único que los detenidos deseaban era que alguien les dijera a sus familias dónde y cómo estaban. "La primera vez que fui, tengo que admitirlo, estaba un poco en estado de shock, porque no tenía idea de lo que estaba pasando en los centros de detención", dijo Gridley.
Aun así, después de seis años de ser voluntaria y reunirse con los detenidos en Baker, Gridley dice que está sorprendida por lo que escucha y ve.
Los visitantes del centro de detención de Baker solo pueden hablar con los detenidos a través de un monitor de video en el centro de detención durante 15 minutos cada vez. Tras la pandemia de COVID-19, las visitas fueron relegadas a reuniones virtuales en casa a través de HomeWAV, una plataforma de comunicación de reclusos. El centro
no ha vuelto a la comunicación interna desde la pandemia.
A menudo, dijo, los detenidos desaparecen después de una visita. Alguien con quien hablaron en una visita podría estar en el proceso o ser deportado antes de que los voluntarios regresen.
Muchos inmigrantes detenidos en las instalaciones de Baker son transferidos de regiones a horas de distancia, dijo Gridley, lo que limita el acceso a amigos y familiares. Muchos de los detenidos con los que Gridley habló son del sur de Florida, Macclenny está a tres a seis horas de viaje para que sus familiares y abogados lo visiten, dijo.
"Recibieron muy pocas visitas. Y eso fue deliberado. Trataron de dificultar que la gente los visitara", dijo Gridley.
Describió las condiciones "inhumanas" dentro del centro: ropa sucia entregada a los recién llegados, atención médica inadecuada y, en su opinión, una atmósfera de miedo.
El Centro de Detención del Condado de Baker no respondió a las tres solicitudes de comentarios de The Alligator.
“La mayoría de las personas con las que hablé estaban muy agradecidas de estar en Estados Unidos en ese momento, pero asustadas, muy asustadas”, dijo Gridleyshe. “Centro de detención
era un nombre educado para lo que yo consideraba una cámara de tortura”.
Con el tiempo, Gridley dijo que ha escuchado innumerables historias de lo que ella llama incidentes "perturbadores".
Recordó que un hombre de Escocia, que estaba casado con una ciudadana estadounidense y tenía graves problemas de salud, fue deportado en avión a pesar de no estar médicamente apto para volar, según las súplicas de su esposa.
También citó la historia de una detenida a la que llamó Ana, una mujer detenida en Florida que no hablaba inglés.
“La declararon no cooperativa, así que la pusieron en detención”, dijo Gridley. “Tenga en cuenta que son 53 grados. Inicialmente la desnudaron hasta su ropa interior, y luego, en un momento posterior, la desnudaron, y así no tenía nada en esa celda solitaria. Iban por la puerta y miraban por la ventana y se rían de ella”.
La Unión Estadounidense por las Libertades Civiles (ACLU, por sus siglas en inglés) de Florida presentó una demanda de derechos civiles en nombre de Ana el año pasado.
Otro detenido con el que Gridley habló sufrió roturas de costillas cuando fue agredido por otro detenido durante su primer día.
No recibió atención médica, dijo Gridley, y fue reasignado a una litera superior que no podía escalar. El hombre durmió en el suelo. Cuando los voluntarios de Baker Interfaith Friends descubrieron que la instalación carecía de una biblioteca de leyes, donaron libros de leyes, dijo. Poco después, dijo Gridley, el sheriff decidió dejar de aceptar donaciones de libros.
Un perspectivo de primera mano Robin Poynor, un profesor titular de artes visuales de la UF, se involucró profundamente con Baker Interfaith Friends después de escuchar una charla sobre inmigración en un almuerzo de profesores retirados hace casi una década. Cuando alguien mencionó a voluntarios que visitaban regularmente el Centro de Detención del Condado de Baker, estaba intrigado.
Se unió a Baker Interfaith Friends en sus primeros años. Poynor recordó haber viajado al centro los lunes, cuando los voluntarios todavía hablaban con los detenidos a través de monitores de video instalados en cubículos de bloques de hormigón. Lea el resto en línea en alligator.org/section/elcaiman.
@veralupap vpappaterra@alligator.org
La comunidad UF defiende el valor de los estudios de mujeres en medio de la reducción de DEI
LOS DEFENSORES ARGUMENTAN
QUE PROGRAMA TIENE UN IMPACTO QUE EXTIENDE FUERA DEL SALÓN
By Grace McClung Escritora de El Caimán
Traducido por Avery Parker Escritor de El Caimán
Hace cincuenta años, Irene Thompson estaba frente a un mar de 370 estudiantes, preparándose para enseñar la primera clase de UF que era orientada a mujeres. Se sintió abrumada. El departamento de inglés pensó que estaba loca. Lo mismo hizo la administración. La clase, “Imágenes de Mujeres en la Literatura de Ovid por Norman Mailer”, se convocó una tarde y atrajo hombres y mujeres en partes iguales. Según Thompson, muchos de los estudiantes machos se matricularon porque sus parejas estaban matriculadas. Otros esperaron una “sesión de rap”, y alumnos solo querían jugar al “abogado del diablo”.
Para la segunda semana, casi 300 estudiantes abandonaron el curso. Pero los 72 hombres y mujeres que se quedaron ayudaron a marcar un hito en la búsqueda de Thompson para establecer el programa de estudios de la mujer de la UF, que la universidad autorizó
formalmente en 1977.
Ahora, menos de 50 años después, los legisladores estatales están poniendo el progreso del programa en peligro.
Una “amplitud de educación”
En enero, la Mesa Directiva de Gobernadores votó por despojar cursos de estudios de mujeres, entre cientos otros, del catálogo de educación general de UF. La decisión se derivó de una ley estatal de 2023 que ordena a las universidades eliminar la "política de identidad" y el "contenido no probado, especulativo o exploratorio" de las ofertas de educación general.
Una versión anterior de la ley prohibió totalmente los estudios sobre mujeres, aunque la medida fue retirada del proyecto de ley final. Florida es uno de un creciente número de estados donde los estudios sobre mujeres y género han sido atacados por legisladores republicanos, quienes ven los programas como mal equipados para preparar a los graduados para la fuerza laboral y un desperdicio de dólares de los contribuyentes.
"Vas a tener a un camionero pagando por el título de alguien en estudios de género. No, eso no tiene sentido", dijo el gobernador Ron DeSantis en un mitin de 2023 en Iowa.
Más recientemente, la Mesa Directiva de Gobernadores encargó un estudio piloto a nivel de todo el sistema para evaluar el “retorno de la inversión” de los programas de estudios
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sobre mujeres y género, junto con cuatro campos STEM, una medida que algunos profesores y legisladores demócratas ven como un intento de devaluar el programa.
Pero los estudiantes, ex alumnos y profesores argumentan que el valor del programa se extiende más allá del aula, preparando a los graduados para una gran variedad de trayectorias profesionales.
Andreina Fernández, editora de adquisiciones de 29 años de la Universidad de Carolina del Norte Press, se graduó de UF en 2020 con una maestría en estudios de la mujer. Ella le atribuyó al programa de maestría la forma de su carrera y dijo que todo lo que aprendió en UF se aplica directamente a su trabajo diario.
“El centro era un lugar fenomenal para estudiar y desarrollarse como pensadora”, dijo. “Realmente enriqueció mi curiosidad intelectual… fue muy valioso para mí y realmente me ha desarrollado como persona y profesional”.
El Departamento de Género, Sexualidad y Estudios de la Mujer de la UF ofrece programas académicos, becas y títulos de posgrado y pregrado, así como oportunidades de investigación avanzada, según su sitio web. Ofrece un estilo de aprendizaje interdisciplinario, lo que permite a los estudiantes centrarse en las áreas que les interesan ofreciendo certificados de posgrado en varios campos laborales.
Fernández optó por un certificado en Estudios Latinoamericanos y dijo que la "amplitud de la educación" que recibió le dio una "agilidad mental" que le ha servido bien después de graduarse.
Impacto de la reducción de DEI En febrero, UF terminó varias actividades de diversidad, equidad, inclusión y accesibilidad después de que el Presidente Donald Trump firmó un orden ejecutivo para prohibir iniciativas de DEI financiadas por subsidios federales. La medida se produjo un año después de que UF eliminó $5 millones en gastos en programas de diversidad para cumplir con una nueva prohibición a nivel estatal. Si bien ni el estado ni el gobierno federal han prohibido o desfinanciado directamente los estudios de la mujer en la UF o en otras universidades, la campaña contra DEI ha despertado el temor de que los programas percibidos como tradicionalmente de tendencia izquierdista, como los estudios de la mujer, puedan ser los siguientes.
Fernández calificó los recientes ataques contra DEI como un "perjuicio" para los estudiantes.
Lea el resto en línea en alligator.org/section/elcaiman. @gracenmclung gmcclung@alligator.org
Síganos para actualizaciones Para obtener actualizaciones de El Caimán, síganos en línea en www.alligator.org/section/elcaiman.
MONDAY, MARCH 24, 2025
www.alligator.org/section/sports
GYMNASTICS
Jeremy Miranda steadies Florida gymnastics with NCAA Regionals on the horizon
MIRANDA USES HIS OWN GYMNASTICS CAREER TO SHAPE HIS FLOOR COACHING
By Liana Handler Sports Writer
Every meet day, UF gymnastics assistant coach Jeremy Miranda walks into a designated closet for his 150 men’s button-down shirts. After some careful consideration, he selects the one matching whatever leotards the Gators are wearing that evening.
Sometimes, it’s a glittery black and rainbow-striped shirt found on Amazon for $26.90. Other times, it’s a sequin-covered orange button-down. For the SEC Championship, Miranda kept his style muted, simple even: a blue and white Gators long-sleeve to match Florida’s blue and white leotards.
Even when his outfits are simpler, his movements on the sidelines — often copying the dance moves of the gymnasts as they compete on the floor — draw the viewers’ attention away, especially as he launches himself in the air after a routine he’s particularly proud of. Whenever Miranda jumps high above the rest of the Gators, the score is often indicative of his excitement.
“I’m always so embarrassed of myself, because I’m like a proud dad,” he said. “I
MEN'S BASKETBALL
want them to do their best, and I know if they just do what they do every day in practice, their best is enough… I find myself dancing or moving with them to will it out of them, which is hilarious in a way.”
Miranda, who’s been with the program for 18 years, has taught gymnastics greats like Trinity Thomas, Bridget Sloan and Leanne Wong. His next challenge will be to advance a battle-worn Florida gymnastics team past NCAA Regionals after placing third in the SEC Championship.
Purpose, not pressure
The veteran coach has never been too concerned about the competitiveness of the sport. Miranda has always prioritized creating an environment where athletes can be comfortable and relaxed, a feeling harkening back to his childhood experiences in the sport.
As a young boy, Miranda would pull the mattress off his mother’s bed to practice tumbling in the living room. His parents, whom he called his superheroes, were ardent supporters, even when the people outside their house in South Dakota weren’t.
In a state where corn fields stretched to the horizon and country music blasted during high school football games, Miranda was the only person he knew who had any interest in gymnastics, dance or musical theater.
“I was faced with a lot of ridicule, criticism. A lot of people thought, ‘That's not the
right thing, like, why aren't you doing football? Why aren’t you doing the ball sports,’” he said. “But I think because I was so confident with it — I knew that that's what my calling was — I was good at it.”
The closest gym was an hour away, but it didn’t matter. Miranda’s parents pushed him to commit to the sport and compete at the highest level. He advanced through the club gymnastics system until he couldn’t continue further.
“The success that I was able to have in the arts and in gymnastics in particular, I think that that — I don't want to say, silenced the haters — but it did,” he said. “It kind of made people think twice before they wanted to make a comment.”
His dad, who separated from his mother, moved to Florida and encouraged him to train in the Sunshine State. From there, his life was a blur. Miranda competed at Horizon Gymnastics & Dance Academy in Florida and earned a co-national championship on the floor at the 2005 Junior Olympic National Championships. After a two-year coaching stint with the Cornhuskers, he transitioned to UF in 2007.
“That was the hardest transition for me: stepping away from the sport as an athlete,” he said. “But I knew that I wanted it to be a part of my life in some capacity… It was the perfect segue from finishing my career as a
gymnast and transitioning and giving back to the sport in a choreographical way.”
Despite taking on a new role as UF’s assistant coach, one thing has remained the same since his days practicing acrobatics at home: the support and openness of gymnastics.
Collecting smiles, not points
One major obstacle gymnasts must overcome is the training drilled into them from a young age. In club gymnastics, the overarching goal is to score points through complicated or highly technical sets of acrobatic passes — the part of the routine where they show off flips and twists. Sometimes, this mentality continues in college.
Graduate student Victoria Nguyen, who joined Florida in 2023, enjoyed the freedom she didn’t have when she competed at Georgia. Her routine grounds itself in the music of Hayao Miyazaki, a critically acclaimed Japanese filmmaker who founded the $245 million animation titan Studio Ghibli.
When creating the acrobatic and dance parts of her routine, Miranda and Nguyen watched clips of her favorite Miyazaki films for inspiration.
Read the rest online at alligator.org/ section/sports.
@handlerliana lhandler@alligator.org
With the Big Dance underway, Florida waltzes into Sweet Sixteen
THE GATORS ADVANCED PAST THE FIRST WEEKEND FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE 2017
By Noah White Sports Writer
Florida’s locker room in Raleigh, North Carolina, was anything but peaceful throughout the weekend. Buried underneath the Lenovo Center, the Gators sat in silence. They hadn’t faced anything quite like UConn, and it was becoming noticeable.
Only two days earlier, UF head coach Todd Golden entered the locker room similarly frustrated, punching a hole in an NC State-supplied whiteboard after his team had just given up an 11-0 run to No. 16-seed Norfolk State. The Gators were going to win, but he knew the level of effort wasn’t on par to an NCAA Tournament run.
“Regardless of the final score, we just weren't as sharp as we expect to be and what we feel like we need to be if we want to make a run in this tournament,” Golden said on Friday.
Entering halftime tied 31-31, the adjustments he spoke of hadn’t come to fruition against No. 8 seed UConn on Sunday. Florida was shooting 36% from three, while also struggling to hold onto the ball, turning it over nine times.
As the halftime buzzer sounded, Golden’s group walked solemnly off the court and into the tunnel, grunting in frustration. UF had 15 minutes to come up with adjustments and 20 to implement those changes.
For the vast majority of the second half, it didn’t look like the Gators had anything new to offer. Nearly five months of play, eight months of practice and years of recruiting had come to a head. That was until senior guard Walter Clayton Jr. took the ball up the court with less than three minutes in the contest,
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trailing for the entirety of the second half and currently down 61-59.
After handing the ball off in a pick-and-roll with sophomore forward Alex Condon, the AP first-team All-American guard wrapped around to the right wing. In a swift motion, he gathered a handoff from the sophomore and launched. The ball rotated in the air for seven-tenths of a second. It was in that moment when Florida’s resiliency showed itself.
“After about 34 minutes of it not looking like it was going to go our way… We made winning play after winning play down the stretch in the last six,” Golden said.
When Golden arrived in Gainesville, he emphasized the need for a culture change. It had been five years since UF’s last Sweet Sixteen appearance, and the Gators hadn’t graced the SEC Championship since 2014. There was a sense of complacency he needed to wring out, and he did that rapidly.
Over the last month, the Gators have established themselves as one of the most adaptable teams in the nation, presenting the adjustment Golden worked expeditiously at making. They toppled No. 1 Auburn 90-81 in a high-scoring affair behind their nation-leading offense. Weeks later, they elbowed out No. 8 Tennessee in the SEC Championship 86-77, holding the Vols off with their top-10 defense, per Kenpom. That versatility, tied with winning 12 of its last 13 games, made Florida a trendy national championship selection entering the tournament.
Golden’s team has been anything but set in its ways, thus sponsoring his anger through UF’s first 75 minutes of sluggish NCAA Tournament play. But in the final moments on Sunday, Florida evolved back into the team that didn’t blink in its five ranked contests of the final 16 days of the season.
“This is why everybody came here,” Richard said of UF’s toughness down the stretch of its recent games. “We wanted
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to bring Florida back to that national stage and that relevance.” He, along with Clayton Jr. and senior guard Alijah Martin, have done just that, and outlasting the Huskies represented the next step along their journey.
When Golden arrived at Florida, his inaugural rattling loss came at home in December 2022. His opponent? The UConn Huskies. During what was ultimately the first of its consecutive championship campaigns, UConn traveled to Gainesville and leveled Florida 75-54, never taking its foot off the gas as the Gators winced.
“We knew this game wasn't going to be easy. They've got a championship pedigree, back-to-back champions,” Clayton Jr. said. “That's a great team. They had that experience. We knew it wasn't going to be easy. We kept our composure. This guy [Golden] especially, he kept us together through the adversity.”
Richard, Martin and Clayton Jr. combined for 56 points in Florida’s 77-75 win against UConn, as the latter led the way with 23. While no member of the trio is much of a high-level NBA prospect, they’ve thrived in Golden’s system, leading the culture switch he emphasized upon his arrival three years ago.
“We have trust in each other, the three senior guards,” Richard said. “We have a lot of experience, and we did a great job trying to keep everybody calm throughout those moments.”
After Sunday’s win, Golden walked into his press conference confident. It had been a long five days in Raleigh.
When he sat down at his labeled seat with a microphone blocking his worn face, he didn’t mince thoughts.
“The time was now for us to take that next step,” Golden said. “Florida basketball [is] back where it belongs.”
@noahwhite1782 nwhite@alligator.org
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