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Tuesday, October 14, 2025

Straws in the Wind - Part 130

From Inside Higher Ed: ...The University of Texas system is reviewing all courses on gender identity to “ensure compliance and alignment with applicable law and state and federal guidance, and to make sure any courses that are taught on a U.T. campus are aligned with the direction and priorities of the Board of Regents,” according to a statement from the system. The review will be discussed at the Board of Regents meeting in November. System leaders at several public institutions have cited Texas House Bill 229, President Donald Trump’s Jan. 20 executive order and a Jan. 30 letter from Gov. Greg Abbott that said, “All Texas agencies must ensure that agency rules, internal policies, employment practices, and other actions comply with the law and the biological reality that there are only two sexes—male and female.” Yet no current federal or state laws prohibit public university professors from teaching about transgender identity...

Hundreds of American colleges and universities are now requiring their faculty to upload syllabi to Simple Syllabus, a third-party platform that offers uniform syllabus templates and easy editing; it also allows faculty to embed syllabi into campus learning management systems. According to the company’s website, more than 500 colleges and universities currently use the platform. Institutions may limit who can view the syllabi—for example, Clemson University requires users to log in with university credentials. But other institutions—including the University of Houston, Texas A&M University and the University of Texas at Austin—allow the general public to view their Simple Syllabus pages. This may be in part due to Texas House Bill 2504, a 15-year-old law that requires public institutions to provide publicly accessible syllabi that include major assignments and exams, required or recommended readings, and a general description of lecture or discussion topics...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/curriculum/2025/10/09/texas-systems-review-course-descriptions-syllabi.

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