UT Austin students protest school’s DEI layoffs amid state ban
The University of Texas at Austin sparked controversy last week when it laid off nearly 60 employees to comply with Texas’ new DEI ban earlier this month.
Some 200 students at the University of Texas at Austin disrupted a virtual faculty council meeting conducted by university president Jay Hartzell on Monday to oppose the school’s decision earlier this month to lay off nearly 60 employees who worked in diversity, equity and inclusion-related positions on campus.
When Hartzell and other university officials logged on to the meeting, they were met with scores of students, all sharing a black background that read “No DEI = Not Our Texas” in red letters.
“We wanted to show them that we want transparency, we want communication from him, we want his support. We want him to address us and to clarify his questions about [State Bill] 17 compliance and the changes he’s been sweeping through our campus,” Christian Mira, of UT Austin’s Queer Trans Black Indigenous People of Color Agency, said of Hartzell. “If he’s going to claim that everything he does is for the students, it’s on our shoulders, it’s our burden to disprove that. We’re not happy with the direction the university’s going in.”
In a message to the school community on April 2, Hartzell announced that UT Austin would close its Division of Campus and Community Engagement and no longer fund programs or activities that support DEI, in accordance with SB 17, a Texas law passed last June that essentially bans DEI efforts at higher education institutions. On Monday, he confirmed reports that 57 employees who worked in DEI positions had been laid off, with eight moved from the positions back to regular teaching jobs. A spokesperson for the university, Brian Davis, confirmed the numbers and, when asked about specific allegations from students and faculty, referred NBC News to Hartzell’s initial message to the university community.
Hartzell wrote in his initial message that the university had begun a “multiphase process” to make changes required by the new law. As a result, UT Austin leaders have broadened some programs, redistributed others and closed DEI programs altogether.
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