https://www.kut.org/education/2024-04-02/ut-austin-dei-diversity-law-sb-17

UT Austin has eliminated multiple staff positions previously focused on
diversity, equity and inclusion in the latest effort to comply with Texas'
anti-DEI law.

Around 60 staffers were laid off Tuesday, according to the Texas
Conference of the American Association of University Professors and the
Texas NAACP.

Senate Bill 17, which bans Texas public universities from having DEI
programs and trainings, went into effect Jan. 1. At the beginning of the
year, UT Austin closed its Multicultural Engagement Center, which housed
student groups like Latinx Community Affairs, the Asian Desi Pacific
Islander American Collective, and Queer and Trans Black Indigenous People
of Color and Allies. It also shut down Monarch, a program that offered
support and scholarships to undocumented students. Members of these groups
say they have struggled to continue their organizations' work on campus.

On Tuesday, the university went a step further and announced it is closing
the Division of Campus and Community Engagement and laying off some
employees who had previously worked on DEI.

"The new law has changed the scope of some programs on campus, making them
broader and creating duplication with long-standing existing programs
supporting students, faculty, and staff," President Jay Hartzell wrote in
an email to the UT community.

To "reduce overlap" and "optimize" resources, Hartzell said UT Austin will
move some of the programs DCCE manages to other parts of the university.
It will also reassign some employees to other duties, while laying off
others.

Forty of the 60 layoffs came from DCCE, the Texas AAUP and NAACP said.

"At the time when they were issued pink slips, all terminated employees
were no longer in DEI-related positions," the two groups said. "Therefore,
these terminations clearly are intended to retaliate against employees
because of their previous association with DEI and speech that they
exercised prior to their current assignments."

The groups also accused the university of racial and ethnic
discrimination.

When asked for comment, the university directed KUT to Hartzell's email
and declined to answer follow-up questions.

DCCE supported programs to help the university "offer education to those
who may face the most significant challenges in accessing it," according
to its website. Programs included First Generation Longhorns, the
Disability Cultural Center and Women in STEM. Most recently, the division
hosted a Women's History Month celebration.

The university hasn't announced which specific programs will shut down but
provided a list of programs that will continue under other departments.
KUT reached out to employees at DCCE, but didn't receive any more
information.

'Ramifications for non-compliance'
UT's announcement comes a week after state Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-
Conroe � author of SB 17 � said in a letter he was "deeply concerned" that
universities were making superficial changes to comply with SB 17, like
renaming offices or job titles.

"This letter should serve as notice that this practice is unacceptable �
and also a reminder that SB 17 encompasses stringent enforcement
provisions, including the potential freezing of university funding and
legal ramifications for non-compliance," Creighton wrote.

The Division of Campus and Community Engagement was previously known as
the Division of Diversity and Community Engagement. UT Austin changed the
name on Jan. 1. The university has also renamed several other
organizations since SB 17 went into effect.

After UT Austin announced the layoffs, Creighton commended it for "taking
steps to ensure compliance with SB 17."

"While any decision to release staff members is a difficult one, the
efficiencies gained, and reinvestment into recruiting a diverse blend
students and professors, based upon merit, are of the highest priority,"
he said in an email.

Students and staff say the changes the university has made in response to
the law have already been substantial, and the layoffs and closure of DCCE
go beyond what's required.

'A McCarthy-era purge'
Karma Ch�vez, the chair of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies, said the
employees who are losing their jobs were no longer working on DEI policies
or initiatives. Based on what she has observed, Ch�vez � who was speaking
on behalf of herself and not her department � said she thinks those
employees were let go because they had worked on DEI issues in the past.

�I can�t help but see this as a purge of any staff who have training in
DEI � literally like a McCarthy-era purge � because none of the staff
who�ve been fired have any DEI in their portfolio right now,� she said.
�All they had is a history of being in a DEI-related position.�

Lisa Moore, chair of the Department of Women�s, Gender and Sexuality
Studies, also described the layoffs as a �purge.� Moore, who was also
speaking on behalf of herself, pointed out that while people once held
positions related to DEI � jobs for which they were previously recruited �
their responsibilities had been changed to comply with SB 17.

�The fact that they�re not doing that work now and they�re in compliance
with the law doesn�t seem to be the point," she said. "It seems to be the
point that they are going to be bullied and harassed until they leave UT
because they once worked in DEI."

The dissolution of UT services that support students from marginalized
groups has a ripple effect for faculty, Ch�vez said. Professors will
likely find themselves informally filling the gaps that departments and
other programs used to officially provide before SB 17 took effect.

�It�s going to fall into the hands of professors who come from
marginalized backgrounds � so faculty of color, queer faculty, trans
faculty, first gen faculty, immigrant faculty,� she said. �Those faculty
who are already marginalized on this campus who already do a
disproportionate amount of unseen and uncredited service, they will now be
overburdened by this as well.�

Even though SB 17 is not supposed to impact what professors teach in the
classroom, Ch�vez said she thinks the writing is on the wall for
departments like hers.

�I have 100% confidence that my department � and Black Studies, and Gender
and Women Studies, and Native American/Indigenous Studies and Asian
American Studies � that we are next on the chopping block,� she said. �I
have no doubt that the ultimate goal is to get rid of all of us who are
doing any kind of work that reflects people who do not come from a
predominantly white, middle class, heterosexual, Christian background.�

Moore said the layoffs are already having an impact on the university�s
ability to educate students. She said she knows department chairs have
lost senior staff, none of whom were working on DEI policies.

�We have a charge from the state constitution to operate a university of
the first class, and if we can�t run our academic departments without
interference from the Legislature, then we can no longer compete with the
top universities in the country and around the world,� she said.

A graduate student employed by DCCE also said their program and others
being shut down were already "fully SB 17 compliant" before the layoffs
and that the decision to close DCCE feels "retaliatory."

"There's no offices that are doing diversity training anymore," they said.
"There's no specific support for student groups that are focused around an
identity group."

The student asked to be anonymous because they're worried about keeping
their employment for the rest of the semester.

"A lot of these staff that are being laid off are people who might write
[students'] job recommendations, who have been supporting them all the way
through job applications and graduate applications and life changes," they
said. "I think a lot of students are feeling like they're losing a lot of
support and community spaces."

Texas' Senate Committee on Education will conduct a hearing next month to
monitor state universities' progress on implementing SB 17. University
chancellors are asked to give updates on how they're eliminating DEI
initiatives.

--
We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.

Durham Report: The FBI has an integrity problem. It has none.

No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.

Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
fiasco, President Trump.

Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.

President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.