Bilingualism Is Our Strength: Supporting Our Children, Educators, and Communities, by Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D. Oct. 25, 2026

Bilingualism Is Our Strength: Supporting Our Children, Educators, and Communities

by

Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

October 25, 2026

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I want to share a few excellent resources from the Texas Association for Bilingual Education (TABE) that speak to an issue very close to my heart: the importance of bilingual education and the fundamental right of children and communities to have their languages, cultures, and identities respected and nurtured in our public schools. Note: For readability and ease, I re-cast most of the information in these flyers below.

Throughout my career, I have advocated for educational approaches that build upon, rather than subtract from, the linguistic and cultural resources children bring to school. Indeed, this concern lies at the heart of my 1999 book, Subtractive Schooling: U.S.-Mexican Youth and the Politics of Caring (State University of New York Press). 

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When schools treat children's home languages as obstacles to overcome instead of intellectual and cultural resources to cultivate, they risk undermining not only students' educational opportunities but also their relationships with their fellow immigrant peers, families, communities, and cultural histories. We can and must do better.

I am an unwavering supporter of bilingual and dual language education, and of the extraordinarily dedicated teachers, university professors, researchers, and community advocates who have sustained this work, often against considerable political and institutional obstacles. 

I am equally committed to supporting the next generation of bilingual educators, including the students who are future bilingual educators involved in BESO (Bilingual Education Student Organization) at the University of Texas at Austin and various other universities across our state. 

These aspiring educators represent a vital part of our educational future. Their commitment to bilingualism, biliteracy, cultural understanding, and educational justice deserves our recognition, encouragement, and institutional investment.

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Our universities have an indispensable role to play in preparing bilingual and dual-language teachers, supporting rigorous research, and strengthening the partnerships with schools, families, and communities that make successful bilingual education possible. At a time when Texas educates more than 1.3 million emergent bilingual students, we should be expanding—not diminishing—our capacity to prepare the educators these children need.

Equally important, our families and communities deserve meaningful opportunities to access high-quality bilingual and dual-language instruction. 

For example, see this TABE flyer on parents knowing their civil rights also provides advice on how parents and community can advocate for bilingual education.

Such opportunities should not depend upon a family's ZIP code, financial circumstances, or whether a school district has chosen to prioritize linguistic diversity. Nor should bilingualism be reserved for privileged students whose families can afford private enrichment or specialized language instruction. The opportunity to become bilingual and biliterate should be widely available to all children, including English-speaking children who can benefit tremendously from learning another language.

Bilingual education is not simply a matter of language instruction. It is about educational equity, cultural continuity, belonging, and the kind of democratic and inclusive society we aspire to build. It is also about recognizing that our multilingual communities are not a problem to be solved but a tremendous public resource. As our world becomes increasingly interconnected, the ability to communicate across languages and cultures should be regarded as an educational achievement and a public good.

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I am grateful to TABE for producing these accessible and informative materials,which challenge persistent misconceptions about bilingual education and help families understand the options available to their children. I encourage parents, teachers, university students, policymakers, and community members to read and share them widely.

Our goal should never be merely to help children learn English at the expense of the languages they already know. Our goal should be to open doors, expand opportunities, and empower them to become fully bilingual, biliterate, and academically successful without sacrificing the identities and relationships that sustain them.

Finally, I want to extend my heartfelt congratulations and appreciation to Dr. Karina Zuno-Chapa and the entire TABE board for their extraordinary leadership and commitment to advancing bilingual education across our state. Their work is helping to fuel not only the growth of bilingual and dual-language education in Texas but also the broader public understanding, appreciation, and support that these programs so richly deserve.

Of course, TABE is part of a larger movement that includes longtime champions such as the Intercultural Development Research Association (IDRA), alongside dedicated educators, researchers, university students, families, and community advocates who have worked tirelessly for generations to defend and expand bilingual education. What makes this collective effort so powerful is its insistence that bilingualism is not a deficit to overcome but a tremendous intellectual, cultural, and societal asset to cultivate.

2026 TABE Board

Particularly in these times when public education is under attack, thank you, Dr. Zuno-Chapa, the TABE board, and all of our educators who are helping to make bilingualism and biliteracy a reality for more Texas children. Your leadership is strengthening our schools, empowering our communities, and helping build a future in which every child has the opportunity to learn, thrive, and take pride in their linguistic and cultural heritage.

¡Adelante con la educación bilingüe!

Links to flyers: https://tabe.org/index.php (English) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bG0VeVy51W2XND4U4OWIb2h0jnD0zdPd/view (Spanish)

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Adapted from two educational resources developed by the Texas Association for Bilingual Education (TABE): "Myths & Facts About Bilingual Education" and "Empowering Families of Emergent Bilingual Students in Texas."

Texas is one of the most linguistically diverse states in the country. More than 1.3 million Texas public school students are identified as emergent bilinguals—children who are developing English while bringing the knowledge and resources of another language into their classrooms.

For these students, bilingual education is not about correcting a deficiency. It is about building upon an existing strength.

Research demonstrates that children can develop bilingualism, biliteracy, and academic proficiency simultaneously. High-quality bilingual and dual-language programs help make this possible by treating students' languages as educational resources rather than obstacles.

Texas Bilingual Education by the Numbers

According to figures highlighted by TABE and reflected in Texas Education Agency data from the 2024–2025 school year:

• 1.3 million+ emergent bilingual students attend Texas public schools.

• 24% of Texas public school students are identified as emergent bilinguals—nearly one in four.

• 120+ languages are spoken in Texas public schools.

• 85.7% of emergent bilingual students speak Spanish as their primary language.

• 95%+ of Texas public school districts and charter school systems serve emergent bilingual students.

• Nearly one in four emergent bilingual students in the United States is educated in Texas.

These numbers tell an important story: Linguistic diversity is not marginal to Texas public education. It is central to who we are as a state and to the future of our public schools.

Eight Common Myths About Bilingual Education—and What the Evidence Tells Us

Myth 1: Children will learn English faster if they stop speaking their home language.

Fact: Maintaining and developing a child's home language supports additional language learning, including English. Strong literacy skills developed in one language can support learning in another. Children do not need to abandon Spanish or another home language to become proficient in English.

Myth 2: Speaking two languages confuses children.

Fact: Children are fully capable of learning multiple languages. Moving between languages or mixing words is often a normal part of bilingual language development, not evidence of confusion.

Myth 3: Students should leave bilingual programs as quickly as possible.

Fact: Sustained participation in well-designed bilingual and dual-language programs can produce important long-term benefits, including stronger biliteracy and academic achievement. Quickly transitioning students into English-only instruction may interrupt opportunities to develop advanced proficiency in both languages.

Myth 4: Bilingual education is only for students who struggle academically.

Fact: Bilingual education is not remedial education. High-quality programs offer academically rigorous instruction while developing proficiency in two languages. Students can learn challenging academic content and become bilingual and biliterate at the same time.

Myth 5: Speaking Spanish or another language at home will hurt a child's English development.

Fact: Families should continue speaking the languages they know best. Conversations, storytelling, reading, songs, and shared cultural experiences help children develop language, literacy, knowledge, and family connections. These experiences are resources for academic learning.

Myth 6: Dual-language programs are only for Spanish-speaking students.

Fact: Dual-language programs can serve both English-speaking students and students who speak a partner language, including Spanish. Two-way dual-language programs deliberately bring these learners together so that students develop bilingualism, biliteracy, and intercultural understanding.

Myth 7: Being bilingual is useful only for language-related careers.

Fact: Bilingualism is valuable across many professions, including healthcare, law, engineering, business, education, technology, public service, and government. It also strengthens communication across communities and expands opportunities for participation in an increasingly interconnected world.

Myth 8: Losing one's home language is a natural process that does not matter.

Fact: Home-language loss can have serious personal, cultural, and intergenerational consequences. It can weaken communication with family members, diminish access to cultural knowledge, and affect children's sense of identity and belonging. Schools and families can work together to preserve and develop children's linguistic resources.

Why Bilingualism Matters Beyond the Classroom

The benefits of bilingual education extend beyond acquiring a second language.

Academic benefits. Well-designed bilingual programs can strengthen literacy and reading comprehension, support learning across languages, and create opportunities for students to meet demanding academic expectations while developing biliteracy.

Cognitive benefits. Learning and using more than one language provides opportunities to practice cognitive flexibility, language awareness, and adaptation to different communicative settings. Specific cognitive advantages vary across individuals and contexts, but bilingualism itself is not a source of intellectual confusion.

Social and cultural benefits. Bilingualism allows students to communicate across generations and communities, maintain family relationships and cultural traditions, and deepen their understanding of different cultural perspectives.

Economic benefits. Bilingual individuals bring valuable linguistic and intercultural skills to an increasingly multilingual workforce. Their knowledge can expand professional opportunities and improve communication in institutions serving diverse populations.

Perhaps most importantly, bilingual education can help children understand that their languages, families, histories, and identities belong in school.

Understanding Bilingual Education Programs in Texas

Not all programs serving emergent bilingual students are the same. Families benefit from understanding the differences.

1. Dual-Language Immersion

These programs seek to develop proficiency and literacy in two languages while supporting academic achievement and intercultural competence.

One-Way Dual Language: Students generally share a common home language other than English and receive instruction designed to develop both that language and English.

Two-Way Dual Language: Students who speak English and students who speak a partner language learn together, developing proficiency and literacy in both languages.

Dual-language programs are particularly important because their goal is not simply English acquisition but additive bilingualism—developing a new language while maintaining and strengthening another.

2. Transitional Bilingual Education

These programs use students' home language and English for instruction, with the goal of transitioning students toward predominantly English instruction.

Early Exit: Students transition to primarily English instruction sooner.

Late Exit: Students receive home-language instructional support for a longer period before transitioning.

Unlike dual-language immersion, transitional programs generally do not aim to sustain biliteracy in both languages throughout students' schooling.

3. English as a Second Language (ESL)

ESL programs focus on developing English proficiency and ensuring access to academic content.

ESL Pull-Out: Students receive targeted English-language instruction, often outside their regular classroom or core instructional setting.

ESL Content-Based: Students receive academic content instruction in English using approaches designed to support English-language development.

Although ESL programs can provide essential support, they differ from bilingual programs that intentionally develop academic proficiency and literacy in both English and students' home languages.

Why Program Quality and Duration Matter

Not all bilingual programs produce the same outcomes. Strong programs need appropriately prepared educators, meaningful home-language instruction, rigorous academic content, sustained support, and opportunities for students to continue developing both languages over time.

TABE also highlights the expansion of two-way dual-language programs in Texas, reporting growth of more than 70% over the preceding decade. This reflects growing recognition of the value of developing two languages rather than replacing one with another.

What Families and Communities Can Do

Parents and caregivers are children's first language teachers. Their participation is vital.

Families can support their children's development by continuing to speak and read in their home languages, encouraging storytelling and intergenerational conversations, learning about available bilingual and dual-language programs, and asking whether those programs provide sustained opportunities for biliteracy.

Community members can advocate for qualified bilingual educators, stronger teacher preparation, sufficient instructional resources, and access to high-quality programs.

School leaders and policymakers can support this work by investing in bilingual educator recruitment and retention, meaningful family engagement, and programs that treat multilingualism as a lasting educational goal.

The larger lesson is clear: Children should never have to choose between academic success and their linguistic and cultural identities.

A quality education should make it possible for them to retain, develop, and celebrate both.

Source: Texas Association for Bilingual Education (TABE), www.tabe.org. Adapted from its bilingual education myths-and-facts and family advocacy resources. Figures reflect the data presented in the materials; statistics may change over time.

Bilingual Education: Research and Resources

Cashiola, L. (2024, Dec. 16). Bilingualism is a strength Texas is failing to nurture for hundreds of thousands of students. Kinder Institute for Urban Research, Rice University. https://kinder.rice.edu/urbanedge/bilingualism-strength-texas-failing-nurture-students

Fibla, L., Kosie, J. E., Kircher, R., Lew-Williams, C., & Byers-Heinlein, K. (2022). Bilingual language development in infancy: What can we do to support bilingual families? Policy Insights from the Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 9(1), 35–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/23727322211069312

García, O., & Kleyn, T. (Eds.). (2016). Translanguaging with multilingual students: Learning from classroom moments. Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Translanguaging-with-Multilingual-Students-Learning-from-Classroom-Mom/Garcia-Kleyn/p/book/9781138906976

Howard, E. R., Lindholm-Leary, K. J., Rogers, D., Olague, N., Medina, J., Kennedy, B., Sugarman, J., & Christian, D. (2018). Guiding principles for dual language education (3rd ed.). Center for Applied Linguistics. https://www.cal.org/publications/guiding-principles-3/

Intercultural Development Research Association. (2026, May 11). Texas policy for serving bilingual students: Texas Must Expand Excellent Education for Emergent Bilingual Students–IDRA 2025 Policy Digest for Texas. https://www.idra.org/education_policy/texas-policy-for-serving-bilingual-students/

King, K., & Fogle, L. (2006). Raising bilingual children: Common parental concerns and current research [CAL Digest]. Center for Applied Linguistics. https://www.cal.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/RaisingBilingualChildrenEnglishSpanish.pdf

Lehtonen, M., Fyndanis, V., & Jylkkä, J. (2023). The relationship between bilingual language use and executive functions. Nature Reviews Psychology, 2, 360–373. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-023-00178-9

Moncada-Cummings, C. (n.d.). Bilingualism. Ventris Learning. https://www.ventrislearning.com/linguistic-anthropologic-considerations/bilingualism/

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2017). Promoting the educational success of children and youth learning English: Promising futures. National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/24677

Office of English Language Acquisition. (2018). English learner family toolkit. U.S. Department of Education. https://ncela.ed.gov/educator-support/toolkits/family-toolkit

Office of English Language Acquisition. (2024). Dual language immersion playbooks. U.S. Department of Education. https://www.ncela.ed.gov/resources/ncela-resources/playbooks/dual-language-immersion-playbook

Piñón, L., Carreón-Sánchez, S., & Bishop, S. (2022). Emergent bilingual learner education—Literature review. Intercultural Development Research Association. https://www.idra.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Emergent-Bilingual-Learner-Education-%E2%80%93-Literature-Review-IDRA.pdf

Rolstad, K., Mahoney, K., & Glass, G. V. (2005). The big picture: A meta-analysis of program effectiveness research on English language learners. Educational Policy, 19(4), 572–594. https://doi.org/10.1177/0895904805278067

Steele, J. L., Slater, R. O., Zamarro, G., Miller, T., Li, J., Burkhauser, S., & Bacon, M.  (2017). Effects of dual-language immersion programs on student achievement: Evidence from lottery data. American Educational Research Journal, 54(1_suppl), 282S–306S. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831216634463

Texas Association for Bilingual Education. (n.d.-a). Journal of Bilingual Education Research & Instruction [Peer-reviewed journal]. https://tabejournal.org/index.php/JBERI/index

Texas Association for Bilingual Education. (n.d.-b). Professional development services. https://tabe.org/index.php/services/pd-services

Texas Education Agency. (n.d.). Bilingual education: Bilingual and English as a second language education programs. https://tea.texas.gov/special-populations-and-support/english-learner-support/bilingual-education-bilingual-and-english-second-language-education-programs

TXEL. (n.d.). LPAC framework: Parent resources. https://www.txel.org/lpac/parentresources/

U.S. Department of Education, Office of English Language Acquisition. (2016). English learner toolkit for state and local education agencies (SEAs and LEAs). https://www.ed.gov/teaching-and-administration/lead-and-manage-my-school/state-support-network/ssn-resources/english-learner-toolkit-for-state-and-local-education-agencies-seas-and-leas

Valentino, R. A., & Reardon, S. F. (2015). Effectiveness of four instructional programs designed to serve English learners: Variation by ethnicity and initial English proficiency. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 37(4), 612–637. https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373715573310

Valenzuela, A. (1999). Subtractive schooling: U.S.-Mexican youth and the politics of caring. State University of New York Press. https://sunypress.edu/Books/S/Subtractive-Schooling

WIDA. (n.d.). Engaging families and communities. https://wida.wisc.edu/teach/engagement

Zelasko, N. F. (n.d.). Bilingual education. Education Encyclopedia. https://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/1788/Bilingual-Education.html

What the 2027 Rankings Do—and Do Not—Tell Us about Texas Higher Education, by Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

What the 2027 Rankings Do—and Do Not—Tell Us about Texas Higher Education

by 

Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

October 22, 2026

The newly released U.S. News & World Report rankings deserve more scrutiny than the usual horse-race coverage of who moved up and who moved down. The headline is that six Texas universities remain among the nation's top 100. But underneath that relatively reassuring news is a striking pattern of decline among a number of the state's public universities—and particularly among institutions in the University of Texas System (Wilhelm, 2026).

UT Austin fell from No. 30 to No. 34 nationally. Texas A&M dropped eight places, from No. 51 to No. 59. Outside the top 100, UT Dallas fell 11 places, UT San Antonio and UT Arlington each fell 14, UT Rio Grande Valley fell 37, Texas State fell 31, UT Tyler fell 13, and the University of Houston–Clear Lake fell 35 (Wilhelm, 2026).

The UT System pattern in particular merits attention. Every UT System institution singled out in this article for year-to-year movement declined: Austin by four places, Dallas by 11, San Antonio by 14, Arlington by 14, Rio Grande Valley by 37, and Tyler by 13. That does not establish that something systemwide caused these declines. Texas Tech, Prairie View A&M, and Texas A&M–Kingsville, for example, moved upward, so there is no uniform “Texas effect” (Wilhelm, 2026). But when several institutions operating under the same system and state policy environment move downward simultaneously, it is reasonable to notice the pattern and watch whether it persists.

At the same time, we should be very careful about what these rankings actually measure. A university's ordinal position is not the equivalent of a report card. UT Austin did not suddenly become "four places worse" as a university. Rankings are relative: an institution can improve on important measures and still fall because other universities improve faster, because institutions enter or leave its comparison group, or because the ranking formula itself changes.

And the formula did change this year.

For the 2027 rankings, U.S. News replaced graduate indebtedness with a new "earnings by major" measure worth 5 percent of the score and began using the updated 2025 Carnegie classifications (Baity, 2026; U.S. News & World Report, L.P., 2026). More broadly, student outcomes account for about 52 percent of the U.S. News formula, while academic peer assessment alone accounts for another 20 percent; faculty and financial resources, standardized test scores, and research measures make up much of the remainder (Baity, 2026).

That context makes UT Austin’s decline especially interesting. The university itself reports that freshman applications reached a record 98,841 this year, its four-year graduation rate rose to a record 77.7 percent, and it awarded a record 16,801 degrees during 2025–26 (University of Texas at Austin, 2026). UT also remains the No. 1 public university in Texas and No. 8 among public universities nationally according to these same U.S. News rankings (University of Texas at Austin, 2026; Wilhelm, 2026). In other words, the four-place decline in the overall ranking coexists with several indicators of very strong institutional performance. That alone should caution us against interpreting No. 34 rather than No. 30 as evidence of a four-step deterioration in educational quality.

UTRGV offers an even more dramatic lesson about the limitations of composite rankings. Its overall national ranking fell an eye-catching 37 places to No. 250 (Wilhelm, 2026). Yet in the very same 2027 rankings, UTRGV climbed 30 places to No. 26 nationally for social mobility and tied for No. 1 among Texas public universities on that measure (University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, 2026). Which ranking tells us what UTRGV actually contributes to higher education? 

For an institution whose mission centrally involves expanding opportunity in one of the nation's most economically challenged regions, its performance in graduating Pell Grant students arguably tells us something that its position in a single national prestige hierarchy cannot. The U.S. News social mobility measure specifically assesses institutions’ success in enrolling and graduating students who receive Pell Grants (University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, 2026).

This is why rankings are never neutral descriptions of "quality." They embody decisions about what counts. Is a great university one whose graduates command high salaries? One with highly paid faculty and abundant financial resources? One highly regarded by other university presidents and provosts? One that produces research? One that enrolls economically disadvantaged students and actually gets them to graduation? 

U.S. News combines these different purposes into a single number using a weighted set of student-outcome, peer-assessment, faculty-resource, financial-resource, research, and other measures (Baity, 2026). The ranking then asks us to believe that No. 34 meaningfully distinguishes an institution from No. 30—or even from the seven universities tied with UT at No. 34. The ranking gives us a precise number, but not necessarily a precise measure of educational quality.

Still, I would not dismiss the Texas declines. Rankings matter precisely because people believe they matter. Prospective students see them. Parents see them. Legislators and governing boards cite them. Potential faculty recruits see them. University leaders use them in fundraising and institutional branding. And because 20 percent of the U.S. News score comes from peer assessment, reputation itself becomes part of the ranking calculation (Baity, 2026). A deterioration in how academic leaders elsewhere perceive an institution can therefore eventually become measurable even when its graduation rates and research productivity remain strong.

That point bears watching in Texas. A recent 2026 Faculty in the South survey drew responses from 1,023 Texas faculty members; about 35 percent said they planned to seek employment outside Texas in the coming hiring cycle, and roughly 70 percent said they would not encourage graduate students or faculty colleagues to seek employment in the state (Surjadi, 2026). Because this was a voluntary survey rather than a representative sample of all Texas professors, those figures should not be treated as population estimates. The survey was distributed through email and social media, with invitations sent to more than 85,000 addresses across participating states (Boedy, 2026). But the results are meaningful evidence of faculty sentiment and of potential recruitment and retention problems that universities should take seriously.

We should therefore resist a tempting but premature conclusion: the 2027 rankings do not prove that recent changes in Texas higher education caused UT Austin or other Texas universities to fall. Much of the information entering these rankings is necessarily retrospective. The new earnings measure, for example, looks at graduates’ earnings four years after graduation (U.S. News & World Report, L.P., 2026). Policies and institutional decisions made in 2025 or 2026 therefore cannot plausibly explain many of the outcome measures appearing in a ranking released in September 2026.

The more important question is prospective: What happens to these universities over the next five years?

If Texas universities become less successful at recruiting and retaining distinguished faculty; if institutional reputation among academic peers weakens; if research capacity deteriorates; if students increasingly choose institutions elsewhere; or if the academic breadth of universities is narrowed, those effects will eventually appear somewhere—in research productivity, faculty resources, graduate programs, peer assessments, student demand, or other measures of institutional quality.

That is why UT Austin’s movement from No. 30 to No. 34 should neither be sensationalized nor waved away. One year's ranking is a data point, not a verdict. But alongside substantial declines at a number of other Texas public institutions—and particularly the cluster of declines across UT System campuses—it is a data point worth remembering (Wilhelm, 2026).

The real test will not be where Texas universities stand in one magazine's rankings this September. It will be whether, five or ten years from now, they remain places where exceptional faculty want to work, talented students want to study, consequential research can flourish, and universities possess the intellectual breadth and institutional conditions necessary to fulfill their public mission.

References

Baity, C. (2026, September 22). ECU once again named among nation’s best colleges. East Carolina University. https://news.ecu.edu/2026/09/22/ecu-once-again-named-among-nations-best-colleges/

Boedy, M. (2026, September 10). Results from the 2026 Faculty in the South Survey. Academe Blog. https://academeblog.org/2026/09/10/results-from-the-2026-faculty-in-the-south-survey/

Surjadi, M. (2026, September 14). More professors want to leave Texas this year, citing political climate, censorship, survey says. The Dallas Morning News. https://www.yahoo.com/news/videos/more-professors-want-leave-texas-124335563.html

University of Texas at Austin. (2026, September 22). UT sets academic performance records, remains the No. 1 public university in Texas. UT News. https://news.utexas.edu/2026/09/22/ut-sets-academic-performance-records-remains-the-no-1-public-university-in-texas/

University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. (2026, September 23). UTRGV rises to No. 26 nationally for social mobility in U.S. News & World Report rankings. The Newsroom. https://www.utrgv.edu/newsroom/2026/09/23/2027-us-news-world-report-best-colleges.htm

U.S. News & World Report, L.P. (2026, September 22). MIT claims No. 1 spot in U.S. News 2027 Best Colleges rankings. PR Newswire. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/mit-claims-no-1-spot-in-us-news-2027-best-colleges-rankings-302885278.html

Wilhelm, M. (2026, September 22). Six Texas schools crack U.S. News & World Report’s 2027 top 100. Chron. https://www.chron.com/texas/article/texas-us-news-2027-best-colleges-22436271.php

Six Texas schools crack U.S. News & World's 2027 top 100
Some Texas schools climbed while others took a tumble.
By Molly Wilhelm, Trending ReporterSep 22, 2026

19 FEB 2015: Campus Life photos taken at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, TX.
Sam Houston ranked among U.S. News & World's 2027 Best Colleges regional list for the West. NCAA Photos/NCAA Photos via Getty Images

April 3, 2012. Sewall Hall in Rice University with a student walking in the hallway. Rice University was the top ranking Texas university among U.S. News & World's 2027 Best Colleges list. aimintang/Getty Images
U.S. News & World Report released its Best Colleges of 2027 ranking, and six Texas institutions cracked the top 100.

Houston's Rice University was the top-ranked for Texas, landing at No. 16 nationally—tied with Brown University in Rhode Island, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee and Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.

The publication measured academic quality and student outcomes using graduation and retention rates, post-graduation earnings, faculty resources and research, financial resources, incoming students' SAT and ACT scores, and other factors, according to the methodology.

But how did other Texas institutions fare, and did any see a major shift?

Texas A&M main campus clock tower. Texas A&M ranked among U.S. News &
World's top 100 in its 2027 Best Colleges ranking, down eight spots from
last year.Riley Davidson/Getty Images

Texas schools in the top 100

No 16. Rice UniversityTied with Brown University, Vanderbilt University and Washington University in St. Louis.

Up one place from 2026 rankings.

No 34. The University of Texas-AustinTied with Boston University, University of California-Davis, University of California-Irvine, University of Florida, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Wake Forest University.

Dropped four places from 2026 rankings.

No 59. Texas A&M UniversityTied with Brandeis University, Florida State University, George Washington University, Stevens Institute of Technology, Stony Brook University-SUNY, Tulane University of Louisiana, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and University of Pittsburgh.

Dropped eight places from 2026 rankings.

No 85. Southern Methodist UniversityTied with Fordham University, New Jersey Institute of Technology, University at Buffalo-SUNY and University of Delaware.

Rose three places from 2026 rankings.

No 90. Baylor University and Texas Christian UniversityTied with Gonzaga University, Marquette University and Yeshiva University

Baylor dropped two places from 2026 rankings, TCU rose seven places.

University of Texas Rio Grande Valley campus, Brownsville, Texas. The school
fell nearly 40 spots in U.S. News & World's 2027 Best Colleges list.Christine_Kohler/Getty Images

Outside of the top 100, some Texas institutions drop nearly 40 places

Outside the top 100, 12 Texas universities and colleges moved more than 10 spots from last year's national rankings, with some shifting by nearly 40 places:

No. 121. The University of Texas-Dallas (tied)Dropped 11 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 186. Texas Tech University (tied)Rose 12 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 227. University of Texas-San Antonio (tied)Dropped 14 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 236. University of Texas-Arlington (tied)Dropped 14 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 250. The University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley (tied) Dropped 37 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 288. Texas State University (tied) Dropped 31 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 308. Abilene Christian University (tied) Rose 21 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 308. University of the Incarnate World (tied) Dropped 15 places from the 2026 rankings.

No. 317. Prairie View A&M University (tied) Rose 26 places from 2026 rankings.

No. 332. Texas A&M University- Kingsville (tied) Rose 20 places from the 2026 rankings.

No. 342. The University of Texas at Tyler (tied) Dropped 13 places from the 2026 rankings.

No. 353. University of Houston-Clear Lake (tied) Dropped 35 places from 2026 rankings.

19 FEB 2015: Campus Life photos taken at Sam Houston State
University in Huntsville, TX. Sam Houston ranked among U.S.
News & World's 2027 Best Colleges regional list for the West.

NCAA Photos/NCAA Photos via Getty Images

The top 10 Texas regional universities and colleges

In addition to its national rankings, U.S. News & World Report ranked the top 50 regional universities and colleges. Texas schools were included in the "West" category.

The publication defines regional universities as institutions offering a wide range of undergraduate programs and some master's degrees, but few doctoral programs. Regional colleges focus on undergraduate education, with most degrees in professional fields.

Texas' top 10 regional universities

St. Edward's University (No. 6 overall)
University of Dallas (No. 10 overall, tied)
St. Mary's University of San Antonio (No. 12 overall, tied)
LeTourneau University (No. 29 overall, tied)
Stephen F. Austin State University (No. 29 overall, tied)
Texas A&M International University (No. 34 overall, tied)
West Texas A&M University (No. 37 overall)
Hardin-Simmons University (No. 38 overall, tied)
Sam Houston State University (No. 48 overall, tied)
University of Houston-Downtown (No. 48 overall, tied)

Texas' top 9 regional colleges
Southwestern Adventist University (No. 12 overall, tied)
Texas Lutheran University (No. 12 overall, tied)
Houston-Tillotson University (No. 22 overall)
McMurry University (No. 23 overall)
Howard Payne University (No. 27 overall, tied)
Wiley College (No. 42 overall)
Jarvis Christian University (No. 46-50 overall)
South Texas College (No. 46-50 overall)
Texas College (No. 46-50 overall)

While the University of Houston didn't crack the top 100 nationally, it ranked No. 67 when compared to public universities across the U.S., tied with seven other institutions. It ranked fourth when looking solely at public universities in Texas, according to a UH press release.

"The University earned Top 100 rankings in several other key categories, including Most Innovative Schools (No. 65), Best Value Schools (No. 78) and Best Colleges for Veterans (No. 96)," UH wrote on Tuesday.

Several other schools also ranked in the top 100 for public colleges: UT Austin at No. 8, Texas A&M University at No. 24, The University of Texas-Dallas at No. 58 and Texas Tech University at No. 96.

Inside the Conservative Takeover of the University of Texas, by Forrest Wilder, Texas Monthly

Friends:

The conservative takeover of the University of Texas is well underway, and Forrest Wilder’s powerful Texas Monthly investigation lays bare just how far it has progressed. What emerges from his reporting is not simply a story of administrative restructuring or ideological disagreement, but a far-reaching transformation of our flagship university through political interference, the erosion of shared governance, and the systematic weakening of academic freedom. 

For myself and others, it feels more like an "occupation," as opposed to "bureaucratic restructuring."

Particularly alarming is the dismantling of Ethnic and gender studies programs, the marginalization of faculty expertise, and the chilling climate of fear and self-censorship taking hold on campus. Wilder situates these developments within UT’s longer history of political assaults on intellectual independence, reminding us that the university has faced—and resisted—such threats before. 

The central contradiction is impossible to ignore: How can a university aspire to greatness while undermining the very intellectual freedom, diversity of knowledge, and democratic principles upon which academic excellence depends? What is at stake is not simply UT’s national standing, but its public mission, its moral credibility, and the future of higher education as a cornerstone of democracy. 

I am so very grateful to Wilder for this illuminating piece. We've been here before. We can and should push back on this today. 

Our reputation is at stake.

-Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

Politics & Policy

Inside the Conservative Takeover of the University of Texas

A secretive president. A crusading provost. A domineering legislature. What are UT’s new leaders building?

By Forrest Wilder | Nov. 2026 | Texas Monthly

Audio narration on this article is provided using an AI voice as a service to our subscribers. Texas Monthly’s journalism is reported, written, and edited by humans. Learn more and give feedback here.

IIt’s about 1,600 miles from Laredo to Detroit—a long haul by any measure. For Roberto Carlos, who made the trip often as a trucker, the drive was mostly a grind, monotonous and dangerous. Trucking was a hard way to make a living, but it was honest work that his parents, immigrants from Mexico who had settled in San Antonio, respected.

One of the highlights of the trip came in Austin, when he would pass by the University of Texas campus. Carlos would downshift to spend a few more moments gazing at the Forty Acres. Just off Interstate 35, there was the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library and Museum, flanked by majestic live oaks. Nearby sat Darrell K Royal–Texas Memorial Stadium, one of the great venues in college football and the home of the Texas Longhorns. In the heart of campus rose the famous Tower, the 307-foot monument to the school’s ambition and power. From the eighteen-wheeler cab, it all seemed so close and yet so far away.

In a time when higher education is beset by crises and doubts, it’s easy to forget what a place like UT has meant for so many: a ticket out of poverty, an invitation to labor on matters of the mind, an opportunity to contribute, in some small way, to the world’s storehouse of knowledge.

But that was all just theory for Carlos. He had graduated from high school in San Antonio and gone straight to work. After two years of long-haul trucking, he decided that he needed to get a college degree. He didn’t have the grades to get into UT, so he went to Texas State University. After graduating, he taught at Churchill High School, in San Antonio, for five and a half years while working on a masters degree at the University of Texas at San Antonio. The idea was to become a better teacher, but he ended up falling in love with research. He left to get a doctorate at the University of Chicago and then landed his first faculty job at the University of Georgia in 2019.

Carlos and his wife were happy in Athens. They were restoring a home, and his career was taking off. He published an article in one of the top political science journals on how young Latinos often function as adults in their families, helping their immigrant parents navigate unfamiliar systems and customs. Suddenly he was a hot prospect in the brutal academic labor market. Carlos had his dream job in mind: “When my peers were talking about, ‘I want to teach at Harvard’ or ‘I want to teach at Stanford,’ I was like, ‘I want to teach at UT.’ And they would be like, ‘Really?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s the place to be.’ ”

The draw for Carlos wasn’t just the school. It was Texas. “I love Texas. I love H-E-B. I love my family, and I love Whataburger, probably in that order.”

In late 2021 the dream became reality. He landed a tenure-track job in UT’s
government department with an appointment in the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies, which was founded in 1940. In many ways, UT was everything Carlos had hoped for. He got season tickets to football and basketball games. He began working on a book for a top university press. In Carlos, the university had landed a rising star. “He’s such a high-caliber scholar with such a great reputation,” said Hannah Walker, a government professor who helped recruit him. And his students got that invaluable commodity on a college campus: a respected young scholar who loves to teach and is good at it.

Carlos figured he would bleed burnt orange for life. But what he didn’t realize was that he had wandered into the first battle of what was to be a long war.

Much of the Forty Acres is a construction site, with $2.4 billion in projects underway. 
Photograph by Jeff Wilson

In theory, Texas colleges enjoy a degree of freedom and independence. They have a layer of insulation from politics: The governor appoints board members, and these regents in turn hire (and fire) a university’s president. Under state law, governing boards are also obliged to “preserve institutional independence.” The day-to-day business is—or was—conducted through a model of “shared governance,” in which faculty and administrators each have a role in decision-making. To ensure academic freedom, the right to teach and conduct research without political interference, universities established a system of tenure for professors, a promise of indefinite employment that makes it hard, but not impossible, for faculty to be fired for speaking their minds.

But in 2021 that order began to break. That year, according to The Texas Tribune, billionaire donors such as Harlan Crow and Robert Rowling worked behind the scenes with Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick to set up a conservative think tank at UT-Austin, which the Lege seeded with $6 million. Now called the Civitas Institute, it trains students on “liberty and private enterprise.” 

Then in 2022, Patrick announced that he was so sick of the “indoctrination” happening on college campuses—with critical race theory taught by “looney Marxist UT professors”—that he supported a radical proposition: the abolition of tenure for new faculty. Patrick’s proposal was shocking and potentially destabilizing to the state’s system of higher education. Though the ban died in the House, the Legislature codified weakened tenure rules and moved to abolish diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. UT dutifully laid off at least sixty staff members, and the campus’s multicultural center closed. Some faculty might have privately stomached the rollback of the DEI bureaucracy, but the effort to bring colleges to heel was far from over.

In the years to follow, the Republican-controlled Legislature paved the way for UT and other colleges to dissolve their faculty councils—elected bodies that help govern academic matters in the spirit of shared governance—and gave regents sweeping new authority over hiring, curriculum, and degree offerings. 

University governing boards read the room and went even further. Texas Tech University regents would order campuses to shut down any program “ ‘centered on’ . . .   sexual orientation and gender identity.” Meanwhile, at Texas A&M University, restrictions on gender-and race-studies classes would be so far-reaching that a philosophy professor would be told to remove a Plato reading from his course. Texas State would suggest that faculty use AI to help de-wokeify their course’s titles and descriptions.

Carlos, who studies politics for a living, was unnerved by what he was seeing. “The state legislature should have a role in what happens at public institutions,” he told me. But, he thought, politicians were jeopardizing the very thing that made universities a cornerstone of democracy: the right of scholars to teach and do research without government interference. “It really is this idea of, can we ask hard questions even when they’re uncomfortable?”

Carlos was up for tenure in 2025, but he found himself questioning whether UT would remain a place for free thinking. By April of that year—when Patrick encouraged “looney Marxist UT professors” to move to a blue state—he had already accepted a job at the University of Michigan. “Leaving UT was super hard,” he said. “My mom’s still mad.”

He stressed to me that the Michigan offer was attractive. “I don’t want my move to be read as a protest,” he said. “But I do think that the fact that a pretty proud Texan would leave—I would literally stop and clap if somebody sang ‘The stars at night’ —that should spark some reflection about the importance of protecting higher education from unnecessary interference.”

Roberto Carlos, a lifelong Longhorns fan, in November 2022, shortly after he came back to the state for his dream job.Courtesy of Roberto Carlos