Texas Professor Fired After Accusations of Teaching ‘Gender Ideology’

U.S.|Texas Professor Fired After Accusations of Teaching ‘Gender Ideology’

Texas A&M University swiftly fired a lecturer and removed two administrators after a student filmed herself arguing that a children’s literature course broke the law because the coursework recognized more than two genders.

The student cited President Trump, who has signed an executive order saying his administration would push for the recognition of only two genders. After the video taken by the student was posted on social media, Republican politicians in the state, including the governor, demanded quick action from the university, accusing the instructor of “blatantly indoctrinating students in gender ideology.”

The school’s moves were condemned by advocates of academic freedom, who say they represented a state that was veering into authoritarianism at a moment when the Trump administration was using the weight of the federal government to target speech it disfavors.

Mark Welsh, Texas A&M’s president, said he terminated the instructor and removed the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and head of the English department from their posts. He said the course content did not meet expectations and that the description of the course did not match its content.

“This isn’t about academic freedom; it’s about academic responsibility,” he said in a message Tuesday. “Our degree programs and courses go through extensive approval processes, and we must ensure that what we ultimately deliver to students is consistent with what was approved.”

He did not provide any detail in his statement about how the description did not match the course content, and a Texas A&M spokesman did not immediately respond to questions. Mr. Welsh also said the university would conduct an audit to ensure course content and descriptions matched.

In a video posted on Monday by Brian Harrison, a state lawmaker and Texas A&M alum, a student begins filming an image projected at the front of the classroom of a “gender unicorn,” a teaching tool to explain the differences between gender identity and gender expression.

“I’m not entirely sure this is legal to be teaching because, according to our president, there’s only two genders,” the student says. “He said that he would be freezing agencies’ funding programs that promote gender ideology. And this also very much goes against not only myself but a lot of people’s religious beliefs, and so I am not going to participate in this because it’s not legal.”

The professor said, “You are under a misconception that what I’m saying is illegal.”

On President Trump’s first day in office, he signed an executive order that said U.S. policy would recognize only two sexes, male and female. “The Executive Branch will enforce all sex-protective laws to promote this reality,” the order stated.

The arts and sciences dean, Mark J. Zoran, did not immediately respond to a message. The head of the English department, Emily J. Johansen, declined to comment. The lecturer, Melissa McCoul, did not immediately respond to a message.

Texas has moved to restrict policies related to racial diversity in public universities, and this year it barred gender instruction in K-12 schools. But the legislature has not passed a similar restriction on gender instruction in public universities, which still list courses tackling topics such as gender and sexuality in literature, including at Texas A&M.

Gov. Greg Abbott said, in a post on social media responding to the video of the classroom at Texas A&M, that the teaching of gender depicted in the class was “contrary to Texas law.” But it was not clear what law Mr. Abbott was referring to. A spokesman for the governor did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Abbott issued a letter in January following President Trump’s order on gender saying that state agencies must “comply with the law and the biological reality that there are only two sexes — male and female.”

The moves by Texas A&M represented “the death of academic freedom in Texas, the remaking of universities as tools of authoritarianism that suppress free thought,” said Jonathan Friedman, a director with PEN America, a free-expression group, in a statement.

“The decision to remove these academic leaders to satisfy politicians’ demands is an excessive punishment for the alleged violation of transparency requirements,” he added. “When university presidents have little choice but to dismiss faculty members’ expertise and enforce ideological edicts, the space for free speech and open inquiry on our campuses is undeniably being suffocated.”