Students, professors, and experts raise grave concerns about 2025’s SB 37 ahead of Texas Senate hearing

Read a PDF of our statement here.

The Texas Senate Committee on Higher Education will take invited testimony only on SB 37 implementation

CONTACT:
For Texas AAUP-AFT: Marco Guajardo, [email protected], [email protected]
For SEAT: Hayden Cohen, [email protected]
Equality Texas: Naveen Farrani, [email protected], (512) 621-5231
For NAACP LDF: Troi Barnes, [email protected]

AUSTIN, Texas - Today, ahead of the first interim hearing of the Texas Senate Committee on Higher Education, a group of current students, educators, and advocates shared grave concerns about the state's reign of terror over Texas public colleges and universities.

"Censorship doesn't always begin by banning ideas. Sometimes it begins by making those ideas impossible to study. Sometimes it begins by making students believe certain questions simply aren't worth asking," said Valentina Rivas Labarca, a student at University of Houston and an organizing associate with Students Engaged in Advancing Texas. "As a student, I have to ask, 'Who gets to decide what knowledge is valuable-and what isn't?'"

"I enrolled at Texas State believing I'd get a well-rounded education and learn essential skills necessary to enter the modern workforce, including critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration. Instead, this legislation is devastating higher education in Texas and stifling meaningful learning and growth at our colleges and universities. Texas students deserve the chance to grapple with complex topics and be a part of rigorous debate. We don't need political interference in the classroom," said Edwin Jahir Escamilla Flores, a student at Texas State University and an advocate with Young Invincibles.

Texas has historically attracted some of the best and brightest faculty in the country to teach at its colleges and universities. These professors are leaders in their areas of study, with expertise honed by years of education and research. SB 37 tells them what they can and cannot teach and, by extension, what students can and cannot learn.

"The promise of American higher education is the ability to explore new ideas, hear multiple perspectives, disagree respectfully and productively, and ultimately decide for yourself. These overreaches are robbing Texas students of the opportunity to develop the skills and knowledge they need to succeed after graduation," said Lisa B. Limeri, Ph.D., At-Large Officer of the Texas AAUP-AFT chapter at Texas Tech University. "Censorship limits students to hearing only a restricted set of ideas that politicians prefer. By narrowing the focus of what students can learn in college, we risk cutting off the possibility of future innovations we cannot even dream of right now."

Many of the academic departments and degree programs impacted by Texas universities' overzealous implementation of SB 37 fall into either ethnic or women/gender studies.

"If you look at the departments and courses disproportionately affected by this policy-Women and Gender Studies, Queer Theory, Black Studies, Global Climate Change-it's clear that this is blatant censorship disguised as operational efficiency. When courses are canceled and curriculum is policed, students are robbed of countless opportunities to find what excites them, inspire them to learn more, and expand their understanding of the world," said Naveen Farrani, Strategic Communications Manager at Equality Texas. "Policies like SB 37 are turning campuses into monocultures devoid of critical thinking and cultural exchange."

Since 2025, universities across the state have taken restrictive actions that exceed the letter of the law passed by the Texas Legislature through SB 37. This comes with a wave of broader changes in higher education across the state, as universities suppress faculty speech under pressure from conservative activists. A number of individual professors have filed lawsuits against their institutions after they were unlawfully terminated for expressing protected speech.

"The purported implementation of SB 37 across Texas threatens the fundamental promise of higher education: exposure to diverse ideas, challenges to preconceived notions, and development of critical thinking skills needed to succeed. When political officials censor entire fields of study or silence faculty expertise, they weaken the educational institutions that are supposed to prepare the next generation of Texas leaders," said Antonio L. Ingram II, Senior Counsel at the Legal Defense Fund. "These attacks especially impact Black faculty and students, whose identities, expertise, and lived experience are especially targeted by SB 37. Every Texas student deserves an educational environment guided by academic rigor, not political ideology or exclusion."

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