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College course: Gender a social construct, America ‘traditionally heteronormative’

A course underway at a Utah college appears to teach students that gender is a social construct, America is “traditionally heteronormative,” and women and minorities are kept from succeeding by a “glass ceiling.”

A student provided The College Fix with screenshots of recent test questions that asserted as much from a human development course at Snow College, a public community college in Ephraim, Utah.

One question reads: “Gender is a social construct, meaning that it does not exist naturally but is instead a concept that is created by cultural and societal norms,” before prompting students to respond if the statement is true or false.

Test takers who responded “true” received credit, while responses of “false” were marked incorrect, a student enrolled in the class confirmed.

An additional question read, “The United States is traditionally heteronormative, meaning that society supports heterosexuality as the norm.” The answer to this true-or-false question was marked as true.

A third question asked, “The ___________ is the invisible barrier that keeps women and minorities from rising to higher positions regardless of their qualifications.”

The answer to this fill-in-the-blank, multiple-choice question, amid possible answers of glass cliff, sticky floors, homophobia, and glass ceiling, was marked as “glass ceiling.”

According to the course’s description on Snow College’s website, Human Development 1500 teaches students about the “fundamental principles of growth and development from conception through childhood to old age.”

Students also learn about the “biological process of development, as well as the emotional, social, psychological, and cognitive development,” the description adds.

The course from which the test questions originated is taught by instructor Amanda Clark.

Responding to a request for comment, Snow College’s public information officer, Marci Larsen, told The Fix that Human Development 1500 is “offered through a program we had with a third-party vendor.”

“That contract has not been renewed, and this person will no longer be associated with Snow College,” Larsen added, referring to Clark.

She said the decision was made prior to The College Fix’s media request.

Snow College is not the only institution of higher learning where students have been taught that gender is a social construct and that minorities and women are systematically oppressed in America.

Professor Leslie Jones of Valdosta State University was criticized in December of 2022 after teaching students that gender is a “spectrum” and arguing sex is not dichotomous.

“…I teach them very clearly in one lecture that sex is biological. Sex is not dichotomous. When I teach them sex and gender, I teach them really carefully that sex is not a dichotomy,” Jones told The College Fix during a phone interview.

A separate controversy occurred in December of 2022 after a lecturer at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis told medical students that she would “shut that sh** down” if anyone attempted to debate her on the issue of “systemic oppression“ in the United States.

“I have a really hard time being neutral around issues of systemic oppression,” Kaytlin Reedy-Rogier said to a class of medical students, according to a Fox News report.

MORE: UVA taps Liz Cheney as professor of politics, calls her ‘strong conservative’

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About the Author
College Fix contributor David Glasser is a rising second-year student at the Florida State University College of Law, with over six years of news and opinion writing experience for various publications. He is set to graduate in 2026.