A bruising battle over academic freedom is being waged in Texas, where the legislature is poised to give the state power to screen faculty, programs and courses in one of the country’s largest public university systems, and experts say the outcome could reverberate for higher education nationwide.
Conservative lawmakers, who control all levers of government, are advancing a measure they say would hold institutions more accountable and ensure curriculum is “free from ideological bias.” Faculty could be removed or face civil penalties for violations. Schools that fail to comply could be barred from spending state funds.
“Higher education should be about teaching students how to think, not what to think,” Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) said.
The 27-page omnibus bill, which would rate academic programs based on average student debt and “return on investment for students,” has already passed the state Senate. A House committee is expected to consider a version of S.B. 37 on Tuesday. If the chamber also approves the measure, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) is expected to sign it into law.
Opponents say the result would essentially be a takeover of the state’s 126 public universities, community college districts and medical schools, with state officials even allowed to overturn hiring decisions. They fear it could damage the institutions’ reputations and lead to a faculty brain drain.
“It’s a concentration of power in government,” said Brian Evans, president of the Texas conference of the American Association of University Professors. He testified against the legislation in March, contending that it “will infringe on students’ freedom to learn and teachers’ ability to teach.”
The Senate vote that followed, along party lines, was 20-11 in favor.
State takeovers are nothing new here. Republican leaders have used them in recent years to fight blue cities’ policies in elections and K-12 schools. But this is the first power grab at the college level, and higher education experts elsewhere are watching closely.
Its impact would be huge, affecting 80,000 faculty and 1.4 million students. Texas boasts 16 top-tier research universities, more than any other state. Its flagship institution, the University of Texas at Austin, has the biggest endowment of any public university in the country; Texas A&M University boasts the biggest enrollment.
“Texas, being such a large state, if it takes action, you’re definitely going to see other states getting interested,” said Neal Hutchens, a higher education professor at the University of Kentucky who has been tracking the bill. Even among those at the forefront of efforts to police what’s taught at colleges and universities, he added, S.B. 37 is “pushing the envelope.”
The bill comes amid President Donald Trump’s broader war on higher education. In recent weeks, he has issued executive orders banning diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts on campuses; blocking federal dollars to schools that fail to comply; and upending what is required for accreditation. He has focused mostly on elite private universities, including a high-profile legal battle with Harvard. And while his administration published a list of 60 colleges and universities — public and private — under investigation for alleged civil rights violations stemming from pro-Palestinian demonstrations, no Texas schools were cited.
One possible explanation is the fact that state leaders were already several steps ahead in cracking down. When students protested at UT-Austin last year over the Israel-Gaza war, the governor sent 100 troopers in riot gear to make arrests with local police. Legislators banned DEI offices and programs at public universities two years ago, forcing the closure of dozens of multicultural and LGBTQ campus centers.
Sen. Brandon Creighton, a Republican from north of Houston, said he sponsored the DEI ban and the current bill to make state schools more transparent and responsible to Texans. (After the ban took effect, hidden-camera recordings surfaced of staff at some schools discussing how to skirt it.)
“Strong oversight is essential to keeping Texas universities at the forefront of education and innovation,” Creighton said in a statement this spring. “With taxpayer dollars and students’ futures at stake, universities must operate with accountability.”
His new proposal aims to decrease the power of faculty senates, requiring that half of their members be appointed by school presidents. All would be term-limited, advisory only and removable by top administrators for “political advocacy.”
“Faculty senates have operated behind closed doors, steering curriculum decisions, influencing institutional policy, issuing political statements to divest from Israel, and even organizing votes of ‘no confidence’ that undermine public trust,” Creighton’s statement continued.
Another provision would give the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board — composed of nine gubernatorial appointees — the ultimate say in faculty and academic screening. The board would pay special attention to schools’ required core curriculum, to ensure they “do not require or attempt to require a student to adopt a belief that any race, sex, or ethnicity or social, political, or religious belief is inherently superior.”
Complaints lodged against professors would be investigated by a new state ombudsman and the attorney general, currently Ken Paxton (R), an ultraconservative Trump ally.
Angie Hill Price, speaker of the faculty senate at Texas A&M, defended its work when she testified against the measure in March. “I am very concerned how this bill will impact us because we’re not broken,” she said.
During floor debate in Austin last month, Sen. Molly Cook condemned what would be expanded state power to eliminate courses as “censorship.”
“I’ve got constituents reaching out to me saying this is the death of higher ed,” said Cook, a Democrat from Houston and a UT graduate.
Creighton, who also graduated from UT, disagreed, insisting state officials would regulate courses to “ensure that students are well-rounded and equipped with skills necessary to be successful in the workforce.”
Other states have recently enacted laws that rein in various aspects of academia at public colleges. A new Indiana statute limits the power of faculty senates, and one in Ohio restricts how faculty teach and bans faculty strikes. In Utah, legislators required faculty training in academic freedom and mandated that Utah State University create a “Center for Civic Excellence” to oversee a revised core curriculum focused on the Western canon. Florida tried to prohibit schools from teaching concepts related to race, gender and social privilege, but the law was partially blocked by courts.
No state rivals the extreme degree of control being contemplated in Texas, according to Peter Lake, a law professor at Stetson University in Florida.
“Texas is as broad-reaching a legislative endeavor as we’ve seen,” he said. And combined with Trump’s attacks on higher education, the legislation is likely to “embolden red states to experiment with even more control over institutional autonomy, right down to curriculum, hiring and firing, tenure, curriculum review.”
A spokesman for the governor didn’t answer directly when asked if he would sign the measure but cited his State of the State address in February, when he called on public universities to be more accountable.
“College professors have increasingly pushed woke agendas. They have too much influence over who is hired to educate our kids,” Abbott said, insisting the state should “expand the ban on DEI in our public universities. We must purge it from every corner of our schools and return the focus to merit.”
Hutchens, the University of Kentucky professor, said state leaders could face a reckoning if the provisions hurt Texas universities’ bottom line, damaging their brand and their ability to recruit and retain administrators and staff.
Hutchens knows two faculty members at state schools in Texas who are already moving away because of the constraints on DEI. He noted that Jay Hartzell, the president of UT-Austin, is leaving after five tumultuous years to lead the much smaller and less prestigious private Southern Methodist University in Dallas. UT System Chancellor James B. Milliken also is departing after seven years to become president of the University of California.
“That’s indicative of the struggles and what it means to lead a public university in Texas right now. It’s very, very hard,” Hutchens said. “Texas has really built some great institutions. At what point do you harm their ability to strive and achieve excellence? If you want to attract world class talent and innovation, it’s an experiment: How far can you push these institutions?”