A new memo issued by the Texas Tech University System (TTUS) chancellor impacting programs and course content across their five campuses drew sharp criticism for its bigotry in the form of restrictions on LGBTQ+ topics in the classroom to comply with the state's Reforming Faculty Senates Act.
TTUS is a public, state-funded group established in 1999 and includes Texas Tech University, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, Angelo State University, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso, and Midwestern State University.
The memorandum has implications for students, faculty, and LGBTQ+ studies as a whole.
The TTUS memo boldly stated:
"The Texas Tech University System is not waiting to be told what compliance looks like—we are defining it for the rest of the state and the nation."
The memo was condemned by multiple organizations in academia including the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AACU) and the academic freedom advocacy group PEN America.
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Chancellor Brandon Creighton sent new rules on April 9 to the Texas Tech system's five presidents, based largely on Texas state Senate Bill 37 (2025), titled Reforming Faculty Senates, that Creighton himself drafted while serving as a Republican state senator.
Creighton's bill, signed into law by Republican Governor Greg Abbott on June 23, 2025, dissolved faculty senates and transferred their curriculum-making powers to a newly created board of regents.
The TTUS memo said the new guidance will "establish the system-wide standard for all course content and academic offerings across the TTU System." Texas Tech is one of seven public education networks available in the state of Texas and served ~64,000 students as of the 2024-25 academic year.
Critics say higher education at TTUS, and in the state of Texas as a whole, will suffer under the Reforming Faculty Senates Act as studies show quality educators leave states that restrict academic freedom.
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In a further act of hubris, Creighton created his own acronym to replace LGBTQ+—which stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning, Plus other marginalized gender identities and sexualities.
Instead of the widely recognized acronym, Creighton wants SOGI—which stands for Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity—to be used by everyone now under his control.
The memo announced the "phase-out and closure" of all courses "centered on" SOGI in undergraduate majors, minors, certificates and graduate degrees.
Such action will make TTUS graduates unqualified for further education or licensure in some fields. For example, psychology and medical degrees require study of these now banned topics in order to qualify for a graduate program outside TTUS and to qualify for professional licenses in most countries.
Ignoring how their bans will impact the success of students proved the goal wasn't the betterment of education, but rather furthering their Christian nationalist, homophobic, transphobic agenda.
The Creighton-led TTUS Board of Regents added a "strict prohibition on SOGI content in all core and lower-level undergraduate courses."
The memo said that "instructors may not teach that gender identity is a fluid spectrum, endorse the existence of more than two genders, or decouple gender from biological sex as a factual or scientific baseline" because Republican backed "[Texas] state and federal law [there is no federal law, only an executive order from MAGA Republican President Donald Trump] and TTU System guidance dictate that only two human sexes, male and female, are recognized."
The TTUS memo also placed a first-in-the-nation ban on "unacceptable" masters theses and PhD dissertations.
In a separate letter sent to the five TTUS presidents on the same day as the 9 April memo, Creighton wrote:
"Graduate theses and dissertations may only center on SOGI topics as a strictly temporary teach-out exception, explicitly limited to currently enrolled students completing their degrees within formally identified teach-out programs."
In other words, a graduate student in the midst of completing their degree won't be required to begin again if their thesis or dissertation would otherwise be deemed "unacceptable."
Creighton continued:
“Upon the conclusive termination of all designated teach-out programs, no degree-culminating student research within the TTU System will be permitted to center on SOGI topics."
All future masters and PhD candidates' fields of study will be restricted by Creighton and the Board of Regents' bigotry.
People were appalled that the GOP's Christian nationalist agenda was put ahead of education in Texas.
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In December, the TTUS Board of Regents instituted a White nationalist course review process to eliminate any course content that they felt implied an “individual, by virtue of race or sex, is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, consciously or unconsciously."
Such reviews have previously led to courses teaching that slavery was a mutually beneficial arrangement, the genocide of Indigenous Americans never occurred, and the erasure of the historical accomplishments of women and BIPOC.
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