Texas university leaders on Tuesday will share their progress and challenges in carrying out a new state law that gives governor-appointed regents more control over what students learn.

A Texas Senate committee will hear invited testimony only. However, students and professors who say they experienced censorship and other effects under Senate Bill 37 are planning a news conference at the Capitol beforehand.

Under SB 37, governing boards must regularly review universities’ undergraduate course requirements and academic programs. It expands regents’ authority over the selection of campus leaders and faculty senates, groups that represent professors in university decisions. The law took effect Sept. 1, and boards must complete their first review of general education requirements by Jan. 1.

The original bill would have barred required undergraduate courses from endorsing particular policies, ideologies or legislation, but lawmakers removed that language. The final law instead says those courses must prepare students for civic and professional life, the workforce and the “betterment of society.”

Soon after the law took effect last fall, a secretly recorded video of a Texas A&M professor teaching about gender identity intensified scrutiny of college classrooms. Public university systems subsequently reviewed thousands of courses and adopted policies requiring professors to follow approved syllabi; to seek advanced approval for certain lessons about race, gender, and sexuality; or to present controversial topics in a “balanced” way.

Senators will hear from Texas Tech University System Chancellor Brandon Creighton, the former state senator who authored SB 37, as well as officials from the University of Texas and Texas A&M systems.

In an April interview with Everything Lubbock, Creighton called the law “a floor,” not a limitation, saying universities could “expand off of that along that same spirit or intent.” Since becoming chancellor, he’s barred instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in core and most lower-level courses and required advance approval to include it in certain upper-level and graduate courses.

Faculty groups are suing Creighton and the system’s regents, seeking to block the restrictions on grounds that they suppress disfavored viewpoints, discriminate based on sex and are too vague for professors to know what they may teach without risking discipline.

Brandon Simmons, the state’s new higher education ombudsman, is expected to testify publicly for the first time.

SB 37 empowers him to investigate whether universities are complying with SB 37 and the state’s ban on diversity, equity and inclusion programs; compel schools’ cooperation; and recommend that lawmakers block them from spending state funds if administrators do not correct violations.

Simmons’ office has dismissed dozens of complaints and opened one investigation into a student’s allegations that Stephen F. Austin State University operated a prohibited DEI program and discriminated against conservatives. Stephen F. Austin officials told KTRE that the university “complies with all state and federal laws. If there is a governmental investigation, the university will fully cooperate.”

Community college funding

Lawmakers will also review Texas’ performance-based funding system for community colleges.

Last week, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board lowered the amount colleges can receive for certain student outcomes after they outperformed predictions and collectively qualified for more money than lawmakers budgeted for the biennium.

Campus leaders will speak publicly for the first time since learning they will receive millions less than they earned under a performance-funding system adopted in 2023.

Lawmakers could close the gap between what the colleges are owed and what the state can pay through supplementary appropriations during next year’s legislative session.

In the meantime, to lower the dollars Texas owes community colleges, the state’s higher education agency decreased incentives in the funding model for educating low-income students and nontraditional, adult learners, who advocates say are among those who need the most help getting to graduation.

Research security

Research security officials from the University of Texas System, including MD Anderson Cancer Center, and the Texas A&M University System are expected to testify about how they are carrying out House Bill 127, a new research-security law.

The law requires public universities to screen certain foreign researchers or people with professional ties to countries deemed foreign adversaries by federal intelligence officials or the governor, including China, Russia and Iran. Universities must also monitor employees’ international travel and restrict certain gifts and academic partnerships involving those countries.

A Rice University official is expected to testify. Although the private university in Houston is not subject to most of the law’s requirements, HB 127 allows private research universities to participate in a state council that develops research-security standards and guidance.

Sneha Dey contributed to this report.

The Texas Tribune partners with Open Campus on higher education coverage.

Disclosure: MD Anderson Cancer Center, Open Campus, Rice University, Texas Tech University System and The Texas A&M University System have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in The Texas Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.