“Inside the Capitol” examines key bills from the 89th legislative session that impact the Texas State and San Marcos communities. The session began on Jan. 14 and ends June 2.
A bill in the Texas legislature would require sweeping overhauls to how public universities function in Texas.
Senate Bill 37 (SB 37), introduced by State Sen. Brandon Creighton (R-Conroe), would increase the state government’s control of many aspects of universities, such as: more oversight on course curriculum, final say in hiring of faculty, ability to cut minor programs with low enrollment and an easier path to fire tenured faculty.
SB 37 is one of the first 40 bills in the Senate, meaning it’s one of the top priorities of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. In a press release after the Senate passed the bill on April 15 , Patrick criticized the faculty senate at the University of Texas, calling it a “rogue faculty senate” that “foolishly questioned the Texas Legislature’s authority over higher education.”
Cutting programs
Brian Evans, president of the Texas Conference of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), a nonprofit organization that works to promote academic freedom and shared governance in higher education, criticized the bill, saying it would limit faculty’s ability to teach and damage students’ ability to learn.
The original version of SB 37 was introduced on March 13, however, it died in the Senate’s Education K-16 committee. The bill was entirely rewritten and reintroduced on March 25.
“The new bill also has some additional things in there that the old one doesn’t have. The other piece it has is arbitrary closure of academic programs, so they can just decide to shut down a degree program,” Evans said.
Under the bill, if an undergraduate minor program or certificate program has fewer than five currently enrolled students and 10 students who have completed the program in the last two years, it will be investigated to determine whether to be cut or consolidated into another program. For a graduate minor program or certificate program, there would have to be fewer than three currently enrolled students and three students who have completed the program in the last two years to avoid being investigated.
Exceptions would be made for programs less than six years old or that industry data shows significant demand for. Final decisions on all cuts or consolidations would be made by a university’s governing board, not by the university’s administration.
Weakening Faculty Senates
One of the bill’s major focuses is on weakening faculty senates, which are boards made up of faculty members from across the university who make recommendations to university administrations based on education policy, faculty grievances and other issues. Faculty senates have been around for decades, with Texas State’s being founded in 1959.
The bill would require all recommendations by faculty senates be reviewed by the university’s administration, governing body and the university system’s administration before they could be approved. The bill would also limit membership of faculty senates to no more than two members of faculty from each college within their respective university, with half of the senators being appointed by the university’s president.
Rolf Straubhaar, associate professor of counseling, leadership, adult education and school psychology at Texas State, said he supports shared governance in universities.
“I am a big believer in faculty governance and faculty having a voice in decisions that are made about how the university is run … how we recruit students, how we best serve students,” Straubhaar said. “Faculty are the ones who have those students in class … We need faculty voice involved, and weakening faculty senates will just make that harder.”
The Texas State Faculty Senate declined to comment on SB 37, as it has not yet become law.
Increasing the state oversight of course curriculum
SB 37 would require universities to create a “General Education Review Committee” that will review course curricula to ensure it complies with standards under the bill. The committee would consist of members appointed by the governing body of each university.
The standards for curriculum under the bill require that classes: “are foundational and fundamental to a sound postsecondary education; (2) are necessary to prepare students for civic and professional life; (3) equip students for participation in the workforce and in the betterment of society; and (4) do not endorse specific public policies, ideologies, or legislation.”
Evans criticized the bill as an attack on academic freedom in Texas.
“This bill infringes on the academic freedom to learn for the student and the freedom to teach and freedom to research for the professor, ” Evans said.
Straubhaar said he’s concerned that dictating what can be taught in courses will hurt students’ educational outcomes.
“Some of our most desired and sought after courses and the programs I teach in are those specifically where students dive deeply into investigating their own identities, their own personal histories, their own family histories, who helps make up them as people and who has shaped them to be the people they are and the future educational leaders they can be,” Straubhaar said. “Those are precisely the kinds of courses that would be challenged or potentially be on the chopping block under SB 37.”
Investigating noncompliance in universities
The bill would also call for the creation of “The Office of Excellence in Higher Education,” which would “address matters of discourse at institutions of higher education in the state.” The office would be tied to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.
The office would serve as an intermediary between the legislature, public and higher education institutes. It would also be in charge of investigating reports of noncompliance with state law in public universities and colleges.
The bill would require investigations to be launched into reports of noncompliance within 30 days. The findings of the investigation would be reported to the attorney general and the institution’s governing board. Every year, the office would have to report the number of reports filed against a university, the number of investigations done based on the reports and the report’s findings to the governor, lieutenant governor and the attorney general.
Oversight in leadership positions and administrative decisions
SB 37 would give the state more oversight into the hiring of those in leadership positions at universities.
Under the bill, university presidents would be allowed to hire leadership positions, such as deans, the provost and vice presidents, but the governing board of the university would be able to overrule their decision. The bill would also prevent presidents from delegating hiring responsibilities.
SB 37 would require governing boards to regularly conduct performance reviews for those in leadership positions. The review would be based on increasing student retention, increasing graduation rates, increasing research funding and ensuring a “variety of perspectives are represented among administration and faculty.”
Governing bodies would also be allowed to override the decisions made by any university administrations they oversee.
Weakening tenure for faculty
SB 37 would also require universities to conduct performance reviews for professors with academic tenure no more than once a year, but no less than once every six years.
According to AAUP, academic tenure is “an indefinite appointment that can be terminated only for cause or under extraordinary circumstances such as financial exigency and program discontinuation.” AAUP further says academic tenure is meant to safeguard academic freedom in teaching and research.
Under the bill, tenured faculty may be subject to tenure revocations or other punishments if reviews find “incompetency, neglect of duty or other good cause is determined to be present.” “Good cause” is not defined in the bill, nor is there another statute provided in the bill that defines the term.
Straubhaar, who has previously participated in hiring committees at Texas State, said weakening tenure could make it harder to recruit qualified faculty, both for teaching and research purposes.
“We love to talk about how prestigious and highly ranked our research universities are. This bill, and bills like it, will only make recruiting the kind of faculty to keep that up hard,” Straubhaar said. “People will leave, and other people will not want to come.”
According to Evans, previous bills on higher education, such as Senate Bill 17, which banned diversity, equity and inclusion programs in 2023 and a previous bill to phase out tenure, which failed, have already increased the number of professors looking to leave the state.
“We survey faculty in Texas, and we found that 25% of the respondents said they had looked to leave in the last two years … another 25% that said that they’re seeking to leave in the next the next year,” Evans said. “40% said when they interviewed candidates or they had made offers to candidates, they declined because of the legislative climate in Texas, and this applies not only to faculty, but also to administrative positions, like dean-level positions.”
Straubhaar expressed further concern that bills like this could discourage graduate students who wanted to enter academia and could lower the value of any degrees awarded by Texas universities.
Straubhaar also said the bill could give private universities an advantage over public universities, as private schools would not be required to comply with the bill.
“I don’t think it’s by accident that the president of UT decided to go to a private institution. There’s inherently more freedom in private institutions,” Straubhaar said. “Who that hurts are our most low-income students who can’t afford to go to Rice, who can’t afford to go to SMU, who are here at Texas State, or who are at anywhere in the UT System or the A&M system, because to get they can’t afford a private institution.”
As of April 22, SB 37 passed in the Senate and is in the House Higher Education Committee.
