Texas lawmakers are scrutinizing university professors’ influence. Here's how faculty shape their universities.

Friends,

Here is an important piece by Kate McGee of the Texas Tribune.  It provides a great description of what faculty senates (or councils) do—and why faculty governance is essential in higher education institutions.

As the 2025 legislative session begins, there is growing concern that lawmakers will seek to reduce faculty influence "over campus culture and curriculum"—ostensibly taught by "woke" professors like myself, I presume.

Geez, whatever in the world is wrong to want students to think critically about the world around them? They, too, want to make a better world. And what's wrong with teaching them to question assumptions, consider perspectives different from their own, or develop a deeper understanding of complex societal issues—like racial, ethnic, class, and gender inequalities, that are not going to magically disappear simply by silencing this discourse?

And what's wrong with advocating for inclusivity and social justice or creating a more welcoming and equitable environment for students from diverse backgrounds? Mounds of research show that promoting diversity in academic settings prepares students to better navigate a globalized, multicultural, and multilingual world. This is great for business, too.

Conservatives remarkably wonder what the need is for ostensibly "woke" professors when what we need instead is so-called "intellectual diversity." Well, how the heck do we, as universities, achieve their goal of intellectual diversity in learning environments that are monocultural, monolingual, and comprised of the atomized individuals they prize?

Such heralded "individuals," who are ostensibly "intellectually diverse," focus on personal autonomy and self-interest rather than engaging in shared social responsibilities and relationships. When have weaker social bonds and diminished empathy toward others ever been a positive prescription for society—especially in a post-pandemic moment when many youth and young adults long for connection and a sense of common purpose that promotes the public good?

The proof is in the pudding. Our "woke professors" are in high demand because they enrich the educational experience, encourage critical engagement with the world, and foster a more inclusive and socially responsible academic community. If anything, more like us are needed in our overwhelmingly conservative university environments. We contribute to the intellectual vitality and vibrancy that our institutions still need today.

I just read this April 7, 2023 piece by Jabari Simama titled, "In Defense of ‘Woke" that I encourage all to read. In particular, she asks us to "stop allowing right-wing conservatives to appropriate and redefine terms like 'wokeness.'" I couldn't agree more.

Moreover, this narrative of "woke" professors does not equal "woke" universities. Far from it. Rest assured, my conservative friends, that we may differ in our views, but we can still engage in respectful dialogue and work toward common understanding. 

It's regrettable that far-right legislators are swinging a sledgehammer to crack a nut—and much to the detriment of the entire research, teaching, and learning enterprise. We must turn this narrative on its head before it's too late.

-Angela Valenzuela

Texas Legislature 2025

Texas lawmakers are scrutinizing university professors’ influence. Here's how faculty shape their universities.

Faculty senates have long played a key role in developing curriculum and protecting open inquiry. State leaders have also accused them of liberal indoctrination.

By Kate McGee

Dec. 6, 20245 AM Central

Conservative Texas lawmakers and power brokers in recent years have criticized university professors for being “woke” activists who indoctrinate college students with far-left teachings and ideas.

Now, as state lawmakers head back to the Capitol for the 2025 legislative session, they could limit the influence faculty have over campus culture and curriculum. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick wants lawmakers to recommend potential changes to the roles of faculty senates, which traditionally take the lead on developing curriculum — and ensuring professors have the academic freedom to teach and research their subject areas without fear of political interference.

But conservatives say university curriculum has been infused with ideologies that have helped take higher education in Texas in an overly liberal direction.

“If we're going to refocus our universities on their mission of open inquiry and freedom of speech, we've got to take a look at the curriculum and who's controlling it,” Sherry Sylvester, a fellow at the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation, told state senators in November.

Some Texas professors, though, fear the Republican-controlled Legislature could undermine a long-standing balance of power at universities that’s meant to protect higher education from politicization. Their concerns are that without a proper voice on campus, and a guarantee that faculty have control over their teaching and research, faculty might leave Texas or be less likely to take a job at a Texas university, research would be imperiled, and there would be no checks and balances on university leadership.

“There’s very clearly an ideological based attack against higher education and more specifically against faculty,” said Michael Harris, a professor of higher education at Southern Methodist University, a private institution in Dallas. “A place where faculty are most noticeable is a faculty senate.”

Here’s a look at faculty senates in Texas and the role they play in higher education.

What faculty senates do

Faculty senates are made up of professors from across a university. The body approves academic policies, curriculum design, faculty hiring and evaluation, and other issues that impact the academic mission. They also relay university-wide news and plans back to their colleagues.. The senates often meet monthly and invite guests from the administration to speak directly to faculty on university issues.

“They provide a critical advisory voice on so many things we do on campus,” Texas A&M University President Mark Welsh recently told reporters. “The faculty senate does work that is fundamentally important to what we do as a university.”

Faculty at many Texas universities elect a professor in their specific college to serve as a representative on the senate. Faculty will typically elect a chair or co-chairs for a one or two year term. Other faculty members can serve on specific committees that provide recommendations to leadership on specific issues, such as budget, research or facility planning.

Faculty say that it’s vital that they have a voice in the decision making processes and that university boards of regents listen to those on the ground when making decisions that impact their work.

“At a Fortune 500 company, you wouldn't want the CEO to make every single decision,” said Harris, the SMU professor. “They don’t have time. People close to the product line or business aspect are best able to do that. The same thing is true here. You want your faculty who teach undergrads to make policy [about undergrads]. They know the issues there better.”

Bill Carroll served as president of the University of Texas at Arlington’s faculty senate four years ago. He said administrators often haven’t taught in a classroom in years and rely on current faculty to share their experiences that can help shape decision-making.

“The faculty senate can provide that input and that information to administration so they can understand how the faculty are perceiving things and understand what faculty needs to do their job in an effective way,” he said.

How faculty senates fit into a university’s power structure

Public universities and university systems are overseen by boards of regents, who are appointed by the governor. Those boards hire university presidents, who serve as a CEO of the institution.

While there is nothing in state law that specifies how faculty senates should be organized or function, many universities have adopted rules based on the American Association of University Professors’ guidance that faculty have academic freedom in the classroom and in research.

They also rely on the 1966 Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities to guide how boards, presidents and faculty senates interact to operate the university. This statement was developed by national organizations that represent faculty, university presidents and governing boards. The statement spells out who should handle each sector of university operations.

“It's not something that was just drawn up by faculty saying, 'Here is our best practice, deal with it,’” said Joey Velasco, president of the Texas Council of Faculty Senates who also teaches at Sul Ross State University in Far West Texas. “It really was a joint effort.”

Faculty should be responsible for curriculum, methods of instruction and research, the statement reads. If the governing board or university president ultimately makes a decision that goes against the faculty’s wishes, that statement urges the board or president to communicate those reasons with the faculty.

“It’s through open dialogue and mutual respect and a shared vision that faculty, administrators and governing boards can ensure their institutions continue to thrive,” Velasco said.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has routinely criticized faculty senates

Faculty senates found themselves in Patrick’s crosshairs three years ago when he boldly declared he wanted to end tenure for new faculty hires at Texas’ public universities. It was a radical legislative priority condemned by faculty groups across the country.

At the time, Patrick was honest about his motivations: he was angry at The Faculty Council at the University of Texas at Austin. The elected group of faculty had passed a nonbinding resolution reaffirming their right to teach critical race theory in the college classroom after the state banned its teaching in K-12 schools. In the statement, faculty at UT-Austin said they will “stand firm against any and all encroachment on faculty authority including by the legislature or the Board of Regents.”

Patrick called the professors “Loony Marxists” on social media and accused them of poisoning the minds of college students with such teaching. Ending tenure would make it easier to terminate or punish faculty who were teaching these ideas.

Patrick ultimately was unable to outright ban tenure at Texas’ public universities. But Harris said it’s clear that the Faculty Council “poked the bear.”

“I do wonder, were it not for that, would it have been as much on the radar,” Harris said, though he feels like the wave of similar actions at universities in other states, such as Florida, would’ve led Texas to take similar routes.

Faculty senates can formally voice a lack of confidence in university leadership 

Faculty senates largely garner the most attention outside the university when they issue a vote of no confidence in a school leader. These votes are non binding, but are meant as a way for faculty to express their discontent with the direction a president is taking the school. Sometimes, they can lead to the resignation of a university leader. Other times, they’re completely ignored.

Last year, most faculty members at West Texas A&M University in Canyon said they lost confidence in the president for a variety of issues, including his decision to cancel a student drag show on campus. Nothing happened after the vote and Walter Wendler remained president.

At Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, faculty took a vote of no confidence in the leadership of former President Scott Gordon after he accepted an $85,000 pay bump amid a COVID-19 budget shortfall. In that case, the board of regents stood behind Gordon despite the no confidence vote. Still, he stepped down six months later.

Nationally, a Chronicle of Higher Education analysis found that a president ends up leaving office within a year of a no-confidence vote about half of the time.

This spring, more than 600 faculty at UT-Austin signed a letter stating they had no confidence in President Jay Hartzell’s leadership after police arrested a swath of pro-Palestinian demonstrators protesting the war in Gaza. However, that letter came from the UT-Austin chapter of the American Association of University Professors, not the Faculty Council.

Other states have moved to limit faculty power

Across the country, other states have sought to curtail the power and freedoms of faculty. The Arizona Legislature passed a law that would reduce the power of faculty senates. The bill eliminated language in the state that says the faculty “shall participate in” or “share responsibility” for academic and personnel decisions. Instead, professors could only “consult with” university leaders on decisions. Arizona’s Democratic governor vetoed the bill.

When Florida passed a higher education bill that banned diversity, equity and inclusion programs at public institutions last year, it also included language that said public university presidents and administrators are not bound by faculty recommendations or opinions in hiring decisions.

In Texas, at a November state Senate Higher Education Subcommittee meeting, Sylvestor, with the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation, suggested that the Legislature require all faculty senate votes to be public, all meetings be open to the public and live streamed, and all curriculum changes made public.

Many faculty senates at Texas universities already livestream their meetings and post agendas and minutes online. Velasco with the Texas Council for Faculty Senates said many votes are taken publicly, too. But there are instances when private voting is better, he said, such as when faculty vote whether to award tenure.

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: Southern Methodist University, Texas A&M University, Texas Council of Faculty Senates, Texas Public Policy Foundation, University of Texas at Arlington, University of Texas at Austin and West Texas A&M University have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

Friends, 

Check out this excellent recap of many years of history on higher education admissions in Texas by Kate McGee with the Texas Tribune. We must fully advocate for this plan that despite its race neutrality, could get eliminated. 

It therefore behooves Black and Brown community advocates, leaders, and legislators in Texas to form coalitions with their respective rural counterparts on what should be a shared policy agenda in this arena. The reason is not because as Dr. Stella Flores says, it is a "silver bullet" for a diverse entering class, but rather because it has been relatively successful as a remedy, especially in combination with other recruitment tools and strategies.

 In principle, Texas' Top Ten Percent Plan is truly about giving all students in the state of Texas a stab at getting admitted into Texas' flagship institutions, most especially the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A & M University.

-Angela Valenzuela

With race-based admissions no longer an option, states may imitate Texas Top 10% Plan

Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled the practice unconstitutional, admissions experts say other states could look to Texas’ Top 10% Plan as a way to diversify their student bodies.

BY KATE MCGEE JUNE 29, 2023UPDATED: 1 PM CENTRAL

The Texas flag flies on the south lawn of the University of Texas at Austin campus. After the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down the consideration of race in college admissions, some experts say Texas’ Top 10% Plan could become a new model for other states. Credit: Eddie Gaspar/The Texas Tribune

More than 20 years ago, when the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals banned the use of affirmative action in college admissions in its jurisdiction, those trying to diversify Texas public universities panicked, fearing that the ruling would undo years of modest progress they had made increasing the number of students of color at the state’s top public universities.

The impact of the law was immediate. At the University of Texas at Austin, Hispanic enrollment dropped by 15% in one year, while Black enrollment dropped by 25%.

To curb that decline, Texas lawmakers created a “race-neutral” program known as The Top 10% Plan, aimed at giving a broader group of Texas students opportunities to attend state universities by automatically admitting those who graduated in the top 10% of their high school classes.

Researchers found the plan never succeeded in regaining the racial diversity lost after the 1996 ban on race-conscious admissions at UT-Austin or Texas A&M University’s main campus in College Station, nor has it meaningfully changed which high schools are sending students to those schools. But supporters say it helps provide equal access to the state’s top schools, though they say it is not a standalone solution to increase diversity among the student bodies.

Now, two decades later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the use of race in college admissions at two universities, Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, violates the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause, effectively ending race-based considerations in college admissions nationwide.

Following that ruling, admissions experts say percentage plans, including Texas’, could get more attention from other states despite the questionable diversity gains by the Texas plan.

“[T]he effectiveness of percentage plans to make a large, aggregate change in enrollment demographics remains an unsettled issue,” according to an upcoming paper on how state policymakers can respond to the Supreme Court’s ruling. Its authors are James Murphy, deputy director of higher education policy at Education Reform Now, a national education nonprofit, and researcher Virginia Carr Schneider.

The policy exploited the existing racial and ethnic segregation of Texas public high schools, allowing universities to accept students from different areas of the state and a wider array of schools without explicitly considering students’ race. Ever since, the plan has faced criticism from suburban parents, state lawmakers and university leaders who believe it makes it harder for students in well-resourced schools to get admitted to the state’s flagship universities.

“However, percentage plans can have a significant impact on the opportunities of students of color, which, given the lack of evidence for negative effects of percentage plans, means they could still provide benefits, making their implementation worthwhile.”

A plan is born

Texas’ Top 10% Plan was developed in 1997 with the help of Hispanic activists and lawmakers after the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that banned the use of race in admissions in the three states within its jurisdiction, including Texas.

The late state Rep. Irma Rangel, a Democrat from Kingsville, filed a bill that required each public university in the state to automatically admit any students who graduated in the top 10% of their graduating classes.

Critics, including many conservative lawmakers, thought the rule was unfair to white students from well-resourced high schools who might have a harder time reaching the top 10% of their classes. They were also concerned it would send more underprepared students to Texas universities, particularly the flagships, UT-Austin and Texas A&M.

Rangel pointed out that rural high schools struggled to send white students to UT-Austin, as well as students of color, which helped her cobble together a coalition of Black and Hispanic liberals and rural conservatives to narrowly pass the measure. Then-Gov. George W. Bush signed it into law.

While California and Florida also have percentage plans, Texas’ plan is unique because it allows students in the top 10% of their graduating class to choose which school to attend, rather than assigning them a school.

Six years later, in 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court nullified the 5th Circuit’s decision when it upheld the use of affirmative action in college admissions in a case involving the University of Michigan. That allowed Texas universities to consider race again, but The Top 10% Plan also remained.

Eventually, state lawmakers grew concerned that the plan created unintended consequences for UT-Austin, which was accepting more and more of its freshman class through The Top 10% Plan, which meant that there was less space for other students, including out-of-state students or student athletes.

Ultimately, the state Legislature created a carve-out for UT-Austin in 2009, specifying that 75% of each freshman class must be admitted under The Top 10% Plan while the remaining 25% would be admitted through a holistic review process that considers factors such as grade point average, extracurriculars, personal essays and race. That change means the university had to shrink the number of students automatically admitted. Last year, UT-Austin automatically accepted students in the top 6% of their graduating class.

This year, state lawmakers removed a provision in state law that would have forced UT-Austin to admit all students under The Top 10% Plan if a court decision banned the use of race in college admissions. With Thursday’s ruling, UT-Austin can continue to enroll 75% of students through The Top 10% Plan, but it can no longer consider race when accepting the other 25% of the freshman class.

Results so far

When the Top 10% law initially went into effect, the results were positive. Students enrolled under the law had a higher freshman year grade point average than other students, and the number of Black students increased by 44% and the number of Hispanic students grew by nearly 10% at state universities.

But over time, as more data became available to review, researchers started to find that not much had changed in terms of who was enrolling at the state’s flagships.

In 2020, two researchers looked at 18 years of data to see whether the law increased access to Texas’ most selective public universities, UT-Austin and Texas A&M.

They found a slight increase in the number of non-suburban high schools that sent students to those schools, but ultimately determined The Top 10% Plan did not meaningfully change which high schools sent students to UT-Austin or Texas A&M prior to the law’s implementation. The researchers also found that there continued to be more high-achieving students from well-resourced high schools enrolling at the flagships compared with students from other high schools.

Still, supporters argue that scaling back or scrapping the plan would make it harder to create a more diverse student body. According to a data analysis by the Intercultural Development Research Association, the vast majority of Black, Hispanic and Asian students at UT-Austin are accepted through The Top 10% Plan, while the university’s holistic review process disproportionately favors white students.

Data from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board also shows The Top 10% Plan hasn’t helped UT-Austin or Texas A&M reflect the demographics of the state’s 18- to 22-year-olds.

In 2009, 51% of UT-Austin freshmen were white and 23% were Hispanic, while the state’s 18- to 22-year-old population was 41% white and 41% Hispanic. By 2020, that age group was 32% white and 48% Hispanic statewide; UT-Austin’s freshman class was 32% white and 31% Hispanic that year.

At Texas A&M, the gaps were even wider: 55% of the 2020 freshman class was white while 26% were Hispanic.

Meanwhile, Black students made up 7% of the freshman class at UT-Austin and 3% of Texas A&M’s freshman class in 2020 — significantly lower than their 13% share of the 18-22 population.

Stella Flores, a higher education and public policy expert at UT-Austin, said that Texas' percentage plan is not a silver bullet to achieving more diverse student bodies.

"But it doesn't mean it can't be amended or supported with more funding, better recruitment and better outreach so that it can work," she said.

Higher education policy experts say that for percentage plans to work, schools also must recruit students from underrepresented groups and create a welcoming environment for them. That could be more difficult in Texas after state lawmakers passed a bill this year banning diversity, equity and inclusion offices at public universities, said Dominique Baker, a higher education policy professor at Southern Methodist University.

"Some might say the exact office that is supposed to spearhead brainstorming about this and focusing on this has now been declared illegal in the state of Texas," Baker said.

Following the Supreme Court’s ruling, researchers also say the Texas model might not work in other states where racial segregation is not as extreme.

“Indeed, most evidence confirms that the amount of segregation in states that use Top X% Plans is not enough to produce the levels of racial and ethnic diversity achieved under race-based admissions policies,” researchers Kalena Cortes at Texas A&M and Daniel Klasik at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill wrote in a 2020 paper on The Top 10% Plan.

And some higher education policy experts say it’s likely The Top 10% Plan could be the next focus of debate in Texas college admissions. A 2017 bill that died in the Legislature, for example, would have let UT-Austin accept only 30% of its students through the plan rather than 70%.

“That’s coming,” said Murphy with EdReform. “The attacks will come for percentage plans, inevitably.”

Emily Berman, a constitutional law expert at the University of Houston Law Center, said it's possible that those against the use of race in admissions could file lawsuits accusing universities of using "race-neutral" policies for the specific purpose of creating racial diversity.

"It wouldn't surprise me if [opponents] come back and say, even race neutral mechanisms shouldn't be allowed if their purpose is to achieve more racially diverse student bodies," she said, adding that she thinks this argument could be made against Texas' Top 10% Plan.

Disclosure: Texas A&M University, the University of Houston and the University of Texas at Austin have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.