Former Ohio State law professor reflects on how SB 1 led to her early retirement

Trevor Voigt
Thu, 05 Mar 2026 01:13:17 +0000
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Drinko Hall, which houses the Moritz College of Law where Ruth Colker teaches law. Credit: Daniel Bush | Campus Photo Editor

It’s been nearly a year since Gov. Mike DeWine signed Senate Bill 1 into law.

Since the bill’s enactment on March 28, 2025, which became effective in June, Ohio public universities have been required to adjust their policies to comply with the prohibition of diversity, equity and inclusion programming.?

Before the bill was passed, Ohio State eliminated the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the Center for Belonging and Social Change, per prior Lantern reporting.

Ruth Colker, a highly distinguished law professor and the Heck Faust Memorial Chair in Constitutional Law,? said that Ohio State’s “overcompliance” with SB 1 and its DEI rollbacks played a direct role in her early retirement.

“[What] SB 1 itself says and how Ohio State implemented it, those are two different things,” Colker said. “Ohio State’s implementation of SB 1 is what caused me to retire a little earlier than I might have otherwise chosen to retire.”

Colker said Ohio State’s recent policy adjustments to comply with SB 1 weren’t entirely required.

“I don’t believe that what Ohio State has done is required by SB 1,” Colker said.

Ohio State issued an implementation guide for all departments which outlines prohibiting anything that is specifically meant to be “for” or “intended to benefit” one or more protected classes, which includes groups defined by race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender or religion.

The university SB 1 implementation committee also released a guide that outlines six areas that would be affected by the changes, including discussion of controversial beliefs or policies. This can be defined as “any belief or policy that is the subject of political controversy, including issues such as climate policies, electoral politics, foreign policy, diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, immigration policy, marriage, or abortion.”

The guide does not prohibit discussion of these topics, but states that “academic teaching and research activities, including a college or unit communicating about such activities does not constitute endorsement or opposition.”

In addition, Ohio State is required to avoid certain phrases and words in public-facing communications and on Ohio State’s website, deemed DEI language. Outlined in a style guide that went into effect in June 2025, words like diversity, equity, implicit bias, social justice and microaggression cannot be used.

“I’ve seen the university change websites to be no longer accurate because of their attempt to get rid of these words,” Colker said.

Colker gave an example of David Roper, a 2019 graduate of the Moritz College of Law and the first African American editor-in-chief of the Ohio State Law Journal, who received the 2019 Distinguished Diversity Enhancement Award for his dedication in “advocating for diversity and inclusion within the Moritz College of Law and the law profession,” according to a 2019 webpage.?

In June 2025, Colker said Roper was profiled in a Moritz college article for his work “to make the journal an atmosphere where everyone felt welcomed and heard,” not for receiving the diversity award.

“They rewrote why he got the diversity and enhancement award in a way that made it inaccurate because they didn’t want to talk about the fact that he had worked to racially diversify the law journal,” Colker said. “That wasn’t something they could say even though it was factually true.”?

Colker said that the deciding factor in her retirement was a revision regarding the voluntary disclosure of personal pronouns in the classroom.

“I learned through the university’s own webpage that it was impermissible for faculty member[s] to use any university resources to voluntarily request a student to disclose their pronouns,” Colker said.

The implementation guide states that students, faculty and staff can voluntarily share their pronouns but the university does not have a formal system for people to share if they would like.?

Colker said that she had been requesting students to voluntarily disclose their preferred pronouns so as not to unintentionally misgender them, similar to many of her colleagues, so the change came as incompatible to her teaching philosophy and she considers it disrespectful to her students.

“That’s not how I live my life,” Colker said. “It’s important for me to gender people appropriately.”

Colker said that when she was younger, she presented as more androgynous and would be intentionally and unintentionally misgendered as male.

“It’s important to me not to do that to other people,” Colker said. “I’m not trans[gender] but I just don’t really feel like looking like [what] the traditional rules [say] what women should look like,”

Colker said that in the wake of SB 1, some faculty have considered finding jobs elsewhere, or, as in her case, retire.

“I’m also aware of other universities that are deliberately seeking to recruit people at Ohio State, thinking that there are faculty here who would very much like to leave,” Colker said.

Colker said that this type of career move is unusual, that most university professors try to move upward to higher ranked institutions, but “[I’ve seen] people moving laterally, or sometimes even a downward shift.”

“I think we’re going to see an attrition of talented faculty who can find positions elsewhere or retire,” Colker said. “I think that attrition is probably going to disproportionately be attrition by women and racial minorities who are more targeted by SB 1 than others.”

Colker said that this will “harm the overall quality of the faculty.”

Last Friday, Colker was recognized in an Ohio State Law Journal symposium for her contributions to the field of disability justice, her Ohio State faculty profile names her as “one of the country’s preeminent scholars in constitutional law and disability discrimination,” and she has published 17 books and over 90 articles.

More information on Ohio State’s SB 1 compliance can be found on the website for the Office of University Compliance and Integrity.