The job of a university president, especially for a public university accountable to the Texas state legislature, is not one we envy. You are expected to please a diverse range of stakeholders, meaning your students and faculty are not the only people scrutinizing your actions under a microscope. Considering how the advisory committee for your hiring only contained one active student and one alum, we may not even be the most important group for you to please. Of course, this is not a reflection on you personally, but it sets a concerning tone as your term begins.
As UTD’s representative before the UT System’s Board of Regents and university donors, you will have to strike the delicate balance between student, faculty and staff interests against those of wealthy donors and the Republican state government. We understand these political realities, and we know that compromise is the name of the game, but when push comes to shove, we’d rather not see student voices get erased.
In more specific terms, you are joining our community in a moment where it seems to have fractured, with administration on one side and students on the other. But if you’re ready to listen to our concerns and welcome student voices, we could become a campus that is better: a campus that doesn’t mass-fire journalists, doesn’t violently arrest its own students and faculty and allows students to protest, research and express themselves without fear of punishment.
You have a celebrated record for increasing research funding as executive vice president for academic affairs at Rutgers University. For UTD, a school heavily focused on research, that accomplishment is of course a great notch on your belt. In the past year, universities across the U.S. have seen their research funding take a major hit — something our campus experienced firsthand according to outgoing president Richard Benson. UTD needs someone who is going to advocate fiercely for researchers to continue receiving the resources they need as grants dry up or become infinitely more competitive, and we have high hopes that you will be up to the task.
Simultaneously, we want to recognize that while grants, prestige and accolades are important, they are only one of a university’s many responsibilities. Just as important to keep in mind is the responsibility you have towards staff and faculty, the people who keep this place up and running.
UTD needs someone who is going to advocate fiercely for researchers to continue receiving the resources they need as grants dry up or become infinitely more competitive, and we have high hopes that you will be up to the task.
At your previous university, a hiring freeze on part-time lecturers effectively cut 300 adjunct positions, a decision described by faculty members as “thoughtless and callous.” The freeze acted as if these adjunct professors were nothing more than “data points on a spreadsheet” instead of real people whose contributions were essential for the academic operations of a university. Not long after, thousands of academic workers at Rutgers went on strike to demand better pay, more security and recognition for the labor they put in during the pandemic. At least in New Jersey the staff and faculty had the ability to strike, a right that is specifically banned by Section 617.003 of the Texas Government Code. We don’t bring this up to be cynical — tough decisions have to be made when running a large university — but already there is the potential for such dilemmas to be mirrored at UTD, this time with even less ability for faculty and staff to stand up for themselves.
Multiple attendees to the January town hall meeting hosted as part of UTD’s presidential search spoke about the school’s “crumbling institutional support structure,” calling for a president who would hire more staff to better support the needs of our student population, our campus facilities and our overstressed and understaffed offices. We want to see our campus thrive. We want more research, more innovation, more opportunities for national recognition so that UTD’s talented community gets the appreciation it deserves. We do not want that growth to come at the expense of staff, faculty or the maintenance of valuable programs.
The students affected by decisions like this need a larger voice in the process, or at least some sort of notice in advance that such discussions are on the table.
We have already seen the effects of such misalignment as students and faculty have criticized our campus’ much-touted “growth” for prioritizing the appearance of progress over campus facilities and existing programs. For example, take the new multi-million dollar esports center, a state-of-the-art building whose cost and opulence juxtapose the recent attempt to dissolve our track and field team because “budgetary constraints.” The school has the funds to build beautiful museums and gaming facilities, but we somehow forgot to allocate enough money for students to participate in sports they were recruited for — all while we tout our big leap into NCAA Division II sports. Cutting track and field weeks before the semester began understandably sparked widespread backlash causing alumni to circulate a petition asking for its reversal, and while this request was granted — a level of responsiveness that we commend and hope to see moving forward — it is a temporary fix for bigger, more systemic issues.
We are happy to see a strong and vocal alumni community who wish to see our university continue to invest in the athletic futures of current students, but it never should have come to that point. The decision itself came without warning and held the potential to uproot the lives of countless students who had made specific plans around years of collegiate-level competition. The fact that a decision of this scale could happen so quickly, without warning and with so little transparency, is deeply concerning. The students affected by decisions like this need a larger voice in the process, or at least some sort of notice in advance that such discussions are on the table.
Yes, sometimes things need to be cut, and yes, some programs will benefit at the expense of others. As I understand it, that remains one of the more thankless aspects of your job. Yet, that difficulty in and of itself does not mean the best solution is to hide from us, the students affected by your decisions. Expansion and growth themselves are not the problem, but they are all for naught if those on campus — whether they be students, staff, or faculty — are treated like pawns on a chessboard, liable to be moved around and sacrificed at will.
The students affected by decisions like this need a larger voice in the process, or at least some sort of notice in advance that such discussions are on the table.
From here, we move from concerns to demands. There have been choices made and avenues taken by your predecessor that should not be carried forward.
Last year, due to the changes imposed upon Texas universities by the passage of the 88th legislature’s SB 17, UTD saw an entire department replaced and then completely closed. The sudden closure of the Office of Campus Resources and Support, less than one semester into its existence, led to 20 staff members losing their jobs, walking back a prior claim by president Benson that “no one is going to lose a job.” That is 20 people who lost their livelihoods and over 30,000 students who lost valuable services, That is the cost of capitulation, and though the blame cannot be placed on any one party, it is the specter of this loss that haunts us moving forward as the state legislature continues to constrict Texas higher education. It is one thing to follow the law, and it is an entirely separate thing to overcomply and take away perfectly legal programs from students. In one academic year, UTD went from having a nationally-recognized gender center and multicultural center under the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion to remnants of ODEI under the new OCRS; today we don’t even have an official office that houses the legal vestiges of these programs.
This semester is starting under the long shadow of the 89th legislature’s SB 37, which has led to the UT system restricting campus speech in terms we consider an infringement upon First Amendment free expression. We urge you not to continue the precedent of overcompliance set by your predecessor — a man who called law enforcement on peaceful protestors, had nine students and three faculty members arrested and is currently listed as a defendant in an ongoing lawsuit regarding one such arrest.
This semester, things are looking bleak. Your term will begin with no convocation speech, a dissolved Academic Senate — meaning faculty no longer has a unified voice with which to speak to administration — and the removal of all news distribution kiosks on campus, affecting our newspaper as well as local circulations like the Dallas Observer. Bad start.
We urge you not to continue the precedent of overcompliance set by your predecessor — a man who called law enforcement on peaceful protestors, had nine students and three faculty members arrested and is currently listed as a defendant in an ongoing lawsuit regarding one such arrest.
We understand it’s a tough line to walk. You’re starting a new position and you might not want to make waves or cause the university to lose face, but while that point of view is understandable, it only makes sense as long as you think of us as a liability rather than a strength. We as students may not be the most powerful group vying for you to do or say certain things, but as the future of the university, as those creating and consuming the fruits of an active campus, we are the most important.
The existence of The Retrograde proves we don’t need administrative approval to wield a voice. This publication could be placed within a timeline of a campus civil war that started with the removal of the Spirit Rocks — a move by the prior administration signalling that their ideal form of student expression is done through channels they can control. It was shocking and disheartening, but not crushing. Clearly, we are capable of creating avenues of expression in spite of attempts to control or quiet us. Whether you listen to us or not, we will continue to speak. It is up to you to listen.
We aren’t asking you to break the law, but we are asking you not to sacrifice us for it.
We aren’t asking you to break the law, but we are asking you not to sacrifice us for it. Take us into account when the state government imposes upon our freedoms. Stand with us, stand up for us. In this moment when it can feel like academia itself is under attack, you have a golden opportunity. The relationship between administration and students at UTD can be redefined not as one of opposition, but in terms of how we can — together — serve the larger community through innovation and productive conversations. We hope you will take that chance with us.