Texas Tech University faculty say restrictions on instruction about race, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation prompted changes or requests for changes in 277 courses, according to a new survey.
The Faculty Senate survey found about half of respondents said they changed course content on their own because of concerns about the memos from system leaders, while roughly a quarter said administrators or other university personnel asked them to.
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More than half of the 367 respondents noted they were looking for jobs elsewhere because of the restrictions that started trickling down in the fall semester.
The findings complicate the picture Texas Tech System administrators presented this spring, when they said fewer than 60 of the more than 14,000 courses offered across the system’s five universities were recommended for changes after review.
The two counts measure different things. Administrators counted formal review outcomes across the system. The Faculty Senate tried to capture changes professors at the flagship campus in Lubbock said they made or were asked to make.
“We really just want to capture for posterity what’s going on here,” said Alan Barenberg, chair of the Faculty Senate committee who drafted and sent the survey, “because it may be that we can’t change or affect the outcome of things, but people ought to know what took place here.”
Texas Tech University and system officials did not immediately respond Friday to questions about the survey.
Chancellor Brandon Creighton has said the restrictions are meant to comply with state and federal law and to ensure students receive “degrees of value,” which he has described as degrees that prepare students for high-demand jobs with strong pay.
In September, then-Chancellor Tedd Mitchell told university presidents that faculty must comply with President Donald Trump’s executive order, a letter from Gov. Greg Abbott and a new state law, all recognizing only two sexes. Mitchell directed faculty to review course materials, curricula and syllabi and make adjustments where needed.
After Creighton took over in November, he went further, telling faculty in December to submit course content related to gender identity and sexual orientation for review by the system’s regents. He barred faculty from promoting certain concepts related to race and sex, including that one race or sex is inherently superior to another or that people bear responsibility for actions committed by others of the same race or sex.
In April, Creighton issued the most sweeping memo yet, ordering the system’s universities to begin phasing out academic programs centered on sexual orientation and gender identity; barring that content from core and lower-level undergraduate courses while limiting it in upper-level courses; and restricting future graduate theses and dissertation centered on those topics.
Barenberg acknowledged the survey, conducted in May, was not scientific. However, faculty senators had limited options after university officials denied their request to email it to all faculty, he added.
The Faculty Senate posted the survey on its website and put it behind a password-protected login so only people with Texas Tech credentials could access it. Faculty could respond anonymously, he said.
Texas Tech University had 2,157 faculty as of the fall semester, the latest data available. The report noted the survey received more responses than Texas Tech’s annual IT satisfaction survey, which drew 237 faculty responses last year.
“You can say it’s not representative, fine, but I think it speaks very loudly,” Barenberg said.
The survey showed the memos hit some colleges harder than others.
Respondents from the colleges of education, media and communication, and visual and performing arts reported higher levels of changing teaching material on their own than faculty overall. Engineering faculty reported the fewest changes.
Meanwhile, about 18% of responding faculty said they changed their research because of the memos, while 7% said administrators asked them to change their research.
Earlier this month, administrators from the provost’s office met with departments and handed out written feedback from the regents’ academic, clinical and student affairs committee, multiple professors told The Texas Tribune.
In his department meeting, Barenberg said faculty were told the feedback was generated by an artificial intelligence tool. He said that tool flagged readings from his graduate seminar on European historiography, including one week focused on how historians have studied gender and sexuality.
Barenberg said the AI tool also generated feedback that mischaracterized at least one reading and initially appeared to include instructions meant for another course. After he asked the provost’s office for clarification, he said he received a corrected form telling him to teach the course without those readings. He said he was told he could not appeal the decision.
Barenberg said he is not scheduled to teach the course again in the fall. But if he teaches it again, he said he would not follow the directive.
“I’m ethically bound by my discipline to teach history to the best of my ability, and that includes not censoring particular texts because of someone’s political preferences,” Barenberg said.
Before becoming chancellor, Creighton was a Republican state senator. He authored Senate Bill 37, which aimed to limit faculty senates roles on campuses and gave governor-appointed regents more authority over curriculum.
Texas Tech’s Faculty Senate was never especially powerful and typically worked cooperatively with administrators, Barenberg said. But the law forced the university’s senate to reorganize. And the April memo changed the mood on campus from fear to anger, he said.
Now, the Faculty Senate is using its limited advisory role to formally condemn Creighton’s latest memo.
In a resolution also passed this month, faculty senators said Creighton’s April memo would harm Texas Tech, limit what students can learn and impose viewpoint discrimination on students, staff and faculty. They also warned the chancellor’s directives infringe on free inquiry and set a precedent for political interference in academic matters.
Other Texas university leaders also have moved to restrict or reorganize programs and courses tied to race, gender and sexuality.
Texas A&M University System regents barred professors at its 12 universities from advocating for race or gender ideology or bringing up topics related to sexual orientation or gender identity unless a university president approves it in a specific, non-core or graduate course after review. Texas A&M University officials in College Station later eliminated its women’s and gender studies program and canceled or revised courses after reviewing thousands of syllabi.
University of Texas System regents passed a rule requiring its 14 universities to ensure students can graduate without taking courses that include “unnecessary controversial subjects.” The rule says instructors must take a “broad and balanced approach” when courses include controversial issues, but it does not define what that means. UT-Austin is consolidating seven ethnic and gender studies departments.
At Texas Tech, presidents have until June 15 to identify academic programs, majors, minors and certificates centered on sexual orientation and gender identity. Creighton has said universities must then freeze admissions to those programs while current students are allowed to finish their degrees.
The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.