"Reverse racism" is alleged here in the teaching of  so-called "harmful ideologies" when the actual truth was expressed by Rep. Mary Gonzalez (D-Clint) as follows:

“The discourse over the last few weeks with these riders is like ‘We need this rider because we don't want there to be an ideology that supports hate or things like that,’ and I think it's the furthest thing from the truth,” said González, D-Clint. “The truth is that these programs, these initiatives are critical for not only the students but for the communities that we serve in Texas.”

When decades of research to support this kind of intervention in higher education and the workforce (see earlier post), then we're still not getting a real answer for this direction in policy. This leads one to conclude that these lawmakers are xenophobes, threatened by the potential political power and influence of students of color.

So short-sighted and self-serving. So disappointing.

-Angela Valenzuela

Texas House panel sticks funding ban for college DEI programs in draft budget. Here's why.

by Megan Menchaca | March 17, 2023 | Austin American-Statesman

The Texas House Committee on Appropriations approved a rider to the House budget draft that would ban colleges and universities from using state funds on diversity, equity and inclusion programs. 

The rider — an additional provision added to a bill — would prohibit state-supported colleges and universities and other higher education institutions that receive state funding from using that money on DEI practices or programs, including any DEI personnel, training or activities.

“It is the intent of the Legislature that no funds appropriated by this Act may be expended for diversity, equity, & inclusion practices or similar programs, including personnel, training or activities, on state supported college campuses, state supported university campuses or those who receive state funding, notwithstanding state and federal law,” the rider states.

The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Article III, which oversees public education and higher education funding, had previously adopted the rider, proposed by Rep. Carrie Isaac, R-Dripping Springs. On Thursday, the full House Appropriations committee met and approved adding the rider to House Bill 1 — the proposed House budget — as well as several other riders. 

The committee only heard invited testimony from the Legislative Budget Board on Thursday, and members of the public did not have a chance to testify about the rider during the meeting.

More:University of Texas 'operational plan' to execute, track 2022 DEI goals remains unreleased

Friendswood Republican Rep. Greg Bonnen, chair of the Appropriations committee, said the DEI funding ban will be added to the new version of the proposed House budget bill, and the committee could potentially vote to advance the bill to the full House late next week.

The House Appropriations committee and the full Texas House have to approve the chamber's biennium budget. Once the House and the Senate both pass their budgets, if the bills are different, the drafts will be forwarded to a conference committee with members from both chambers that will produce a single bill for the House and Senate to vote on and send to Gov. Greg Abbott for final approval. The Texas Constitution requires lawmakers to pass a balanced budget.

'It hurts me when we have these divisive riders'

Rep. Armando Walle, D-Houston, made a motion to strike the rider from being included in the proposed House budget, but his motion failed by a 16-10 vote. He said he took issue with the rider being included after the committee had worked hard to minimize conflicts and politics in the bill.

“It hurts me when we have these divisive riders, amendments and bills because all that does is sow doubt,” Walle said. “It sows doubt into my sons and many children that have diverse backgrounds. They can't be who they can't see. And so for me, I take this as a personal affront. I take it personally because it hurts.”

More:How diverse are students, employees at Austin-area colleges and universities?

Rep. Gary Vandeaver, chair of the House Appropriations subcommittee that initially adopted the rider, said he recognizes the importance diversity and efforts to bring equity into schools but expressed concern over how he believes DEI principles are being promoted in higher education. 

“We have reports that these principles are being used to promote an ideology that frankly, is concerning to many of us, and it's that promotion of that ideology that I think this rider is really intended to address,” said Vandeaver, R-New Boston.

Rep. Carl. Tepper, R-Lubbock, said that DEI offices in higher education were "blatantly partisan" and engaging in "reverse racism," a term for racism against white people or other privileged groups. Tepper, who has introduced several bills proposing limits on DEI in colleges and universities, said DEI offices are furthering division and "causing more consternation than they're fixing."Multiple Democratic lawmakers on the committee pushed back against including the rider in the budget, arguing that university leaders and state residents should have had an opportunity to speak on the proposal before it was put in the budget, and that it was not appropriate to propose the ban as a rider to the budget instead of in separate legislation.

Rep. Mary González, vice chair of the appropriations committee, said just having a conversation about banning state funds for DEI may lead students, faculty and staff to consider not coming to colleges and universities in the state. 

“The discourse over the last few weeks with these riders is like ‘We need this rider because we don't want there to be an ideology that supports hate or things like that,’ and I think it's the furthest thing from the truth,” said González, D-Clint. “The truth is that these programs, these initiatives are critical for not only the students but for the communities that we serve in Texas.”

Eliminating 'good faith' effort to improve race diversity

The committee on Thursday also approved a rider removing a section from the House budget which states that the Legislature expects both the University of Texas and Texas A&M University to make a "good faith effort" to improve the racial diversity of their student populations.Several Texas colleges and universities have various DEI initiatives and programs in place, which are designed to make marginalized groups — such as people of color, LGBTQ people or disabled people — feel more supported on campus. 

The full nature of those DEI efforts ranges wildly across campuses, but they often include broadly working to recruit diverse applicants for faculty and staff positions and to attract historically disadvantaged undergraduate and graduate students. 

However, DEI policies and initiatives at higher education institutions have recently come under fire by Republican state lawmakers, who have proposed several bills to limit DEI in higher education, including bans on DEI-related offices, statements and training.

Universities navigate diversity as Abbott and GOP target programs

We should very much worry not just about the taking down of DEI programs and initiatives, but also how this is getting done at the moment. Specifically, anti-DEI Rider #186, calling for a Prohibition of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Practices, was tagged onto the House Appropriations hearing on the Texas budget. What followed yesterday on Thursday morning of March 16 in the House Appropriations Committee was a vote to keep this anti-DEI Rider in the higher education appropriations bill, despite appeals by mostly black and brown legislators to take it out. Nevermind that these anti-DEI bills haven’t yet been vetted by their referred committee. On Facebook, I expressed the following:

"Defunding DEI programs in higher education by the Appropriations Committee is an abuse of the process and the public trust. It simply should not have been tagged on to begin with, particularly considering that the implications of this rider on the 1.5M students in Texas higher education are so incredibly vast. It is therefore woefully irresponsible to seek to railroad the process in this way.

My sense of things is that all of this will come back to a floor vote in the Texas house when the appropriations bill itself is ready to be considered."

I added the following with respect to strategy.

"The only thing that occurs to me right now is all of us reaching out to Chairman Rep. Greg Bonnen (R-Galveston) to pull Rider #186 from the appropriations bill and give it a proper hearing in the Higher Education Committee in the Texas House.

A law like this, without proper vetting, that is of such massive consequence—impacting 1.5 million college students across the state—is already, in its current formulation, feeling like root shock. Moreover, what we all saw happen today was an affront both to democracy and standards of human decency and regard that the great majority of Texans share. And I’m not referring to how much “civility” they demonstrated, but rather to their hubris, coupled with their flagrant disregard for the process. Rep. Bonnen's office phone number is 512-463-0729."

-Angela Valenzuela

Universities navigate diversity as Abbott and GOP target programs

The state's flagship universities are vowing to keep pursuing diversity even as Republicans force them to step away from programs that were helping them.

Jeremy Wallace, 

March 16, 2023Updated: March 16, 2023 4:05 p.m. |Austin Bureau

 

Students walk through The University of Texas at Austin.

Ashley Landis, Special Contributor / Ashley Landis

As Republicans attack diversity, equity and inclusion programs on college campuses, the state’s flagship universities are doing everything they can to assure future students and faculty that they are still committed to diversity while also placating GOP leaders.

Over the last two months, top Texas Republicans, including Gov. Greg Abbott, have launched an all-out assault on the programs, known as DEI, at public colleges. While universities point to big diversity gains over the last five years, in part because of their DEI efforts, Abbott has called the practices potentially discriminatory, and some state legislators have vowed to cut college funding in retaliation.

College presidents have responded by appealing to politicians who hold the fate of the budgets in their hands, while also trying to assure students and faculty that they are not retreating from efforts to be more representative of what the state’s population looks like.

“We’re all looking for ways to have a diverse, vibrant campus that works for all our students, all of our community, and do that in a way with excellence,” the University of Texas at Austin President Jay Hartzell told Hearst Newspapers this week, without directly talking about the anti-DEI campaign.

Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp said his system is more committed than ever to getting into diverse communities and neighborhoods to recruit both students and faculty.

But the University of Texas System has already paused new DEI programs and vowed to review all its existing efforts after Abbott sent warning letters to all public colleges on the issue. The Texas A&M University System also announced last month that it was banning requirements for jobs or admissions candidates to submit DEI statements as part of their applications.

The rollback couldn’t be happening at a worse time, according to state Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas. Diversity programs have been a big reason why colleges have seen improvements in their attempts to address systemic racial barriers, he said. West worries that the anti-DEI campaign will drive students from Black and Hispanic families elsewhere, reversing the gains. 

Federal enrollment data shows both UT and A&M have seen improving demographics on their campuses. In 2012, Hispanic students made up just 19 percent of the student population at the University of Texas. Now that number is over 24 percent. Similarly, Black students went from 4 percent in 2012 to now 5 percent.

At Texas A&M, the percentage of Hispanic students jumped from 16 percent to over 23 percent while the percentage of Black students has remained at 3 percent.

The current numbers are still a long way from looking like the state’s population. Statewide, Hispanic Texans make up more than 40 percent of the population, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Black Texans represent 13 percent of the population.

State Sen. Borris Miles, D-Houston, said Republicans are putting universities leaders in a terrible position where they are afraid to say anything.

“They are under pressure by the leadership of this state,” he said. “They are intimidated.”

An uncertain future for the programs

But Abbott isn’t backing off. He has said he supports diversity but that schools are risking violating the law by manipulating DEI requirements in ways that can discriminate against job candidates who have all the merit to get a position.

“What we’ve seen in our universities is DEI practices that are there for political purposes, advancing political agendas,” Abbott, a UT graduate, said in a recent interview with Hearst Newspapers. “It is also used by faculty at the University of Texas and other universities to make hiring decisions that exclude certain people, that do not agree with DEI practices.”

Abbott’s comments come after conservative activists went after Texas Tech University last month because its biology department promised to “require and strongly weight a diversity statement from all candidates.” The university has since rescinded that requirement.

But anti-DEI advocate John D. Sailer said it goes well beyond just Tech. Nationally, he said, schools are imposing DEI priorities in all facets of university life, including making it a litmus test for promotions, tenure and hiring. The result is applicants know it can hurt them if they don't subscribe fully to DEI efforts, Sailer said.

Sailer, who is a fellow with the right-leaning National Association of Scholars, released a report on the University of Texas at Austin in January that warned DEI has “invaded every aspect” of the school.

“These policies espouse a specific set of contentious political views, dictate a new curriculum and embed the principles of DEI into the fabric of the university,” his report said.

At UT, each college, school and unit has a DEI officer as well as a website to highlight the importance of those efforts — a change that has roots in campuswide student protests in 2017 that led to the removal of statues of Confederate soldiers like Robert E. Lee.

Advocates of DEI say conservatives are warping what the program is. While equal opportunity laws have been in place for decades, colleges have failed to hire faculty that looks like the demographics of the state. DEI seeks to get more applicants from underrepresented areas and tries to make sure they have legitimate chances of being considered for jobs and future advancement.

The makeup of faculty at the two flagship universities shows few Black and Hispanic members in comparison to the state’s demographics. At UT, just 10 percent of the faculty is Hispanic and just 5 percent are Black. At A&M, just 5 percent are Hispanic and 4 percent are Black.

Gary Bledsoe, the president of the Texas NAACP, said efforts to kill DEI will hurt Black, Hispanic and other historically underrepresented citizens.

“These programs help minority students navigate through college, and studies show they greatly enhance their prospect of graduation,” he said on Thursday.

The problem for DEI supporters is that Republicans greatly outnumber Democrats in the state legislature and thus control the budget and the agenda. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, a Houston Republican who runs the Texas Senate, has made clear he sees one option for DEI.

“We’re going to wipe that out,” he told supports on a conference call last month.

jeremy.wallace@houstonchronicle.com