The lefty sorts running my alma mater these days are at it again. Despite pushes at the state and national level to rid universities of poisonous racist policies, DEI/CRT is still alive and well at the University of Texas at Austin.
A new report shows the University of Texas at Austin’s School of Education is riddled with critical race theory and other leftwing ideologies.
Last year, a state law took effect that requires universities to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) offices and eliminate discriminatory hiring and training programs. It does not apply to instruction.
Sounds like an oversight to me. Governor Abbott should appoint people to the board of regents who are willing to completely hack DEI out of the system, root and branch.
Nonprofit research organization DeepAudit analyzed 450 UT education syllabi using a machine learning algorithm and identified courses with the highest concentration of CRT and DEI material.
Seven of the ten courses ranked most ideologically-driven fall under the university’s curriculum and instruction department.
DeepAudit’s algorithm scanned for courses that emphasize “equity, diversity, social justice, critical pedagogy, critical consciousness, [and] identitarian political activism.”
According to the nonprofit’s website, its machine learning tool “can help institutions comply with state and federal mandates by using semantic analysis” to assess meaning and context beyond simple keyword searches.
“A reporter investigating DEI and CRT in schools of education would typically have to review every course individually,” reads the report. “Such a process is a barrier to analysis as many schools offer hundreds of education courses.”
“While many have heard reports of critical race theory in schools, few realize how widespread the problem is,” Jonah Davids, a founder of DeepAudit told Texas Scorecard. “These ideas are rarely expressed so openly, and instead are often hidden under labels like ‘culturally-responsive teaching’ and ‘social-emotional learning.’”
“Most legislators, parents, and taxpayers who fund universities have no idea this is happening,” Davids said. “We only looked at one college in one university—who knows how much is out there?”
Foundations of United States Schooling, the UT course that contained the most leftist bias, is required for education majors. It touches on the “development of public schooling in the United States in the context of processes of settler colonialism, racial capitalism, and contests over the meaning of democracy.”
An online summary of the course also says it “examine[s] the politics and policy of education, with special attention to the consequences for students of color, Indigenous students, LGBTQIA students, immigrant students, and students with disabilities.”
Required course readings involved transgender advocacy, decolonization, and critical pedagogy.
According to DeepAudit, the ten UT Austin education courses most infused with CRT are:
- EDC312 Foundations of United States Schooling
- EDC319 Qualitative Inquiry and Education for Social Change
- EDC385G Seminar Program Development and Research
- EDP382G Cultural Diversity and Individual Differences
- EDC380F Sociocultural Foundations
- ELP354S Social Awareness and Critical Consciousness in Student Affairs
- EDC395T Learning Technologies
- ELP354D Equity and Diversity Issues in Education
- EDC395L Language and Literacy Studies
- EDC391G Gender and Race in Education
While sunlight is the best disinfectant, when it comes to UT and other top university systems, the state political establishment has frequently declared “We like our cozy corruption just fine, so please take your disinfectant away and put back the rock.” Such was the case when UT Board regent Wallace Hall uncovered an admissions scandal, and his reward was Joe Straus trying to indict him.
Still, some progress has been made. Back in 2020, UT disbanded its PC police, and it’s at least appeared to comply with shutting down DEI programs, but more needs to be done.
Despite the overwhelming opposition of the voters and elected leaders at the state and national level, many colleges (UT Austin included) still seem to feel that their primary purpose is to indoctrinate students in the victimhood identity politics of the radical left. Universities, UT Austin included, need severe cuts in funding and heavy supervision until they finally stamp out woke indoctrination on their campuses.
Tags: Austin, Critical Race Theory, DeepAudit, DEI, education, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, Texas Scorecard, University of Texas, UT Board of Regents, Valerie Munoz
Expecting Gov. Abbott to appoint reform-minded regents is a long wait for a bus that won’t come. He has appointed EVERY regent at EVERY state school in Texas, so he owns the fact that he’s appointed nothing but potted plants and political retreads, rather than serious overseers.
Recall that when UT regent Wallace Hall (appointed by Gov. Perry) finished his independent investigations, he turned a three foot stack of files over to the the Texas AG. According to what Wallace told me a couple of years ago, those files laid out the detailed evidence for dozens of criminal cases against UT insiders and no small number of bent politicians.
But on his last day in office, the Texas AG quietly closed all those files without prosecuting anyone.
Who was that Texas AG?
That’s right, Greg Abbott, who became Gov. Abbott the next day.
Adding insult to injury, Abbott then refused to reappoint Hall as a UT regent, and allowed the UT Board of Regents to adopt a rule that prohibits any sort of independent investigations by individual regents.
Years ago, during the Fenves administration at UT, longtime UT critic Mark Pulliam secured an audience with Gov. Abbott’s majordomo on education policy, and raised the flag on all sorts of issues he had uncovered at UT — including the that the UT Education Department had become a cesspool of Marxist tripe. His concerns were totally (and rudely) dismissed, but like what Wallace Hall uncovered, what Mark discovered years ago has all been proven correct.
When I last spoke to Wallace Hall, I asked him what the biggest impediment was to reform of higher ed in Texas. He immediately responded “Greg Abbott.” And I suspect he’s not wrong.
It’s been how long since Ann Richards left office? Surly every single state college or university board member in Texas was appointed by a republican governor.
The rational conclusion is that all those “republican” governors were either so incompetent they didn’t know what was going on, or that they didn’t care about it, or that they approved of it.