The order for system-wide course audits by the Texas State University System (TSUS), which was sent out on Oct. 1, has sparked fear among faculty teaching about gender and LGBTQ+ studies.
The call for audits comes less than a week after Texas State removed an LGBTQ+ communication studies class from the course registry and the Texas Tech System moved to limit discussion in its universities. It also follows the firing of an A&M professor for discussing gender identity in class, which led to the resignation of the president of A&M.
“As part of our commitment to academic excellence, and in light of recent inquiries about course offerings, we are asking each campus to conduct a collaborative review of its academic courses, programs, and syllabi,” John Hayek, TSUS Vice Chancellor for Academic and Health Affairs, wrote in an email to the chief academic officers of each TSUS university. “This effort will strengthen our academic mission and affirm the core academic values central to our institutions and system.”
According to Sandra Pantlik, vice president for marketing and communications at Texas State, the audit is currently ongoing. Summaries of the completed audits are due on Jan. 20, 2026, the first day of the Spring semester.
History Professor Jessica Pliley, who teaches about the history of women, genders and sexualities, said she heard about the audit from reading the news, not through the university.
“There’s been zero official communication from the provost’s office. I mean, there was one single email telling us that our course descriptions needed to match the content that we taught,” Pliley said. “But other than that, there has been no communication.”
While the TSUS letter doesn’t explicitly mention LGBTQ+ classes, or any other classes, as examples of what the audit is seeking to remove, the letter was provided to The Star in response to an inquiry about LGBTQ+ classes.
Distinguished Professor of History Emerita Victoria Bynum, who taught the first women’s history class at Texas State, said the letter failing to name specific programs, but instead applying to all courses, was concerning. She said it left the door open for broad changes across Texas State.
“It’s a sweeping review of all courses. That’s the point that I really want to make is that we have many innovative courses that have been inaugurated over the years and centers of study as well,” Bynum said. “I see it much more broadly than just gender studies. It’s an attack on education. It’s an attack on the university’s independence.”
According to TSUS Vice Chancellor for Marketing and Communications Mike Wintemute, changes made after the audit will not be uniform across all TSUS schools.
“It would depend on a variety of factors and might vary from institution to institution, if a course is not compliant with the law or hasn’t been approved through the established review processes,” Wintemute wrote in an email to The Star. 
Along with state pressure, the audit comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order recognizing only two sexes in January. Trump also issued a national security memo on Sept. 25 calling “extremism on gender,” a term that is not defined in the memo, as a “common thread” in motivating political violence.
A tenured professor, who currently teaches a class related to gender and sexuality, spoke to The Star under the condition of anonymity, due to fears of retaliation. She said Trump’s executive order conflates the definition of gender and sex.
“Gender refers to the characteristics of women, men, girls and boys that are socially constructed,” the tenured professor wrote to The Star. “This includes norms, behaviors and roles associated with being a woman, man, girl or boy, as well as relationships with each other.”
According to the World Health Organization, sex refers to “biological characteristics that define humans as male or female.”
State Rep. Brian Harrison (R-Midlothian), who was also the main voice behind the firing of the professor at A&M, and later resignation of A&M President Gen. Mark Walsh, made an X post on Sept. 16, calling out Texas State for offering an LGBTQ+ communications class.
“I just found out that Texas State University is literally indoctrinating students in TRANSGENDER ‘RESISTANCE’ and TRANSGENDER ‘JUSTICE!'” Harrison wrote on X.
Harrison introduced House Bill 2339 in the 89th Legislative Session to prevent universities and colleges from offering courses in “LGBTQ or DEI studies.” However, it failed to pass, meaning that despite significant pressure from elected officials to remove the classes, there is no law banning LGBTQ+ studies at institutions of higher education in Texas.
Despite that, Pliley believes government and university officials are using House Bill 229, a 2025 Texas law that only recognizes two biological sexes, as an excuse to ban the classes. Pliley said that is in direct contradiction to Senate Bill 17, passed in 2023, which explicitly stated class curriculum would not be impacted by DEI bans.
The tenured professor went further than Pliley, instead saying the removal of courses and other recent actions by the university are illegal.
“I cannot believe that this has progressed so far, on such completely flimsy grounds,” the tenured professor said. “To me, it speaks directly to the inability of our administration, not only at the presidential and administrative level of Texas State University, but also down to the colleges themselves; it speaks to just a failure to lead.”
According to Pliley, the pressure from officials, as well as the recent termination of Associate History Professor Thomas Alter, has led to other faculty members self-censoring and deciding not to offer classes that deal with gender and sexuality.
“Everybody is so scared after [the] firing of Tom Alter, that there has been an extraordinary dampening down of free speech on campus,” Pliley said. “People are self-censoring to such an extent that they are choosing not to offer these classes. They’re choosing just not to schedule them for the spring or for the fall of next year, which has a direct impact on students.”
Pliley expressed concerns that some students, such as those minoring in women’s, gender and sexuality studies, could experience delayed graduation dates due to classes not being offered.
According to Pliley, there have also been at least three instances of courses being removed from the course directory by the university administration and not the professor offering the course. She said that none of those courses had any students currently enrolled in them.
Sandra Pantlik, vice president for marketing and communications, refuted that claim, stating the university only removed one class, COMM 3316I: LGBTQ+ Communication Studies, after Harrison’s post. The class was not being offered this semester.
After the class removal, Congressman. Chip Roy (R-Austin) said the university should remove other classes, too. He issued a statement and wrote a letter to Texas State President Kelly Damphousse calling for the removal of a separate LGBTQ+ communications class for graduate students.
“When a public university elevates LGBTQ+ ‘resistance’ and creation of ‘justice’ as learning outcomes rather than subjects for critical debate, it abandons education and embraces indoctrination,” Roy wrote in his letter. “This is not neutral academic inquiry; it is taxpayer-funded activism.”
Audrey Oliver, communication studies alumna, previously took COMM 3316I: LGBTQ+ Communication Studies. Oliver disputed claims that LGBTQ+ studies were indoctrinating students.
“The professor never once told us to do anything in particular, vote a certain way, think a certain way,” Oliver said. “She was just laying out facts. And we were allowed to feel how we felt about it, and we were encouraged to do our own research.”
All three professors also disagreed with the claims about indoctrination.
“I find that word ‘indoctrinating’ interesting because it appears to me that when we educate students on things that, maybe people at other levels or other positions don’t want them to learn, suddenly it’s not education, it’s indoctrination,” Bynum said. “I would like them to explain to me what the difference is between education and indoctrination.”
The professors also characterized the audit and course removals as attacks on the academic freedom and independence of faculty.
“There is currently no academic freedom in Texas,” the tenured professor said. “Freedom doesn’t go away when it’s banned. Freedom goes away when people change anything about their actions and words and activities out of fear. So as far as I’m concerned, it’s gone.”
The three professors expressed concern that actions such as the removal of classes about LGBTQ+ individuals, and possibly other groups in the future, would send a negative message to minority students on campus.
“[State officials] do not serve them at all with this new sort of curriculum that they are envisioning, and it’s a betrayal of the university’s mandate and it’s an insult to the students themselves,” Bynum said.
Pliley worries the curriculum change could lead to some students feeling unsafe at Texas State and others choosing to enroll at different universities.
“If [students] identify within that larger queer umbrella, they say that Texas State had a reputation for being a safe space, and that’s why they wanted to come, or why they did come,” Pliley said.
Oliver said she was not surprised that the university would no longer offer the class, but that she disagreed with its removal.
“It’s bizarre, because it’s not even a required class,” Oliver said. “It’s a communications class, but it’s not part of the core curriculum. So no one’s forced to take it.”
Bynum said she can’t recommend that every faculty member speak out against the crackdown on courses and faculty speech because she doesn’t know everyone’s situation, but she hopes more professors will speak out.
“I do understand the fear and so I want to express sympathy for those people and for what they fear, but at the same time express my sorrow, that more people don’t feel that they can speak up because I do think we need everyone who can to speak up, and that’s why I am,” Bynum said. “In fact, I’m afraid that if we don’t all participate at whatever level we feel we can safely do, we’re gonna lose this battle.”
The tenured professor expressed concern that more current students aren’t willing to speak up about this issue.
“What remains true is that students, they have a voice, and they have enormous power in banding together and letting the administration know that they’re really unhappy with what’s going on,” the professor said. “We’ve seen students get programs created because they banded together and asked for them, and really protested in favor of them. This is the time now for it to happen again.”
This is a developing story. The University Star will update as information becomes available.
