U. Texas at Austin President Leaving School After Trying to Implement a More Conservative Vision
“Hartzell’s tenure has been marred with tense political battles on campus that pitted faculty and students against the administration.”
The University of Texas at Austin has a reputation for being pretty far left. I can’t say I blame him for leaving.
The Texas Tribune reports:
UT-Austin President Jay Hartzell will leave to lead SMU
University of Texas at Austin President Jay Hartzell said Tuesday he is leaving the UT System’s flagship school to become the next president of Southern Methodist University, marking a major change in Texas higher education leadership and leaving open a job at the center of the state’s culture wars days before the start of a new legislative session.
SMU’s Board of Trustees unanimously voted to name Hartzell as the next president of the private university in Dallas on Tuesday. In a press release, Hartzell said that this was an opportunity “I could not pass up.”
“I look forward to building upon the university’s remarkable momentum and leading SMU into its next era,” he said.
Hartzell is expected to leave UT-Austin at the end of the academic year and will take over as SMU president June 1. SMU’s current president, R. Gerald Turner, will transition this summer to the role of president emeritus. He has led the university for three decades.
“Dr. Hartzell is a well-respected academician and higher education leader with a strong track record of accomplishments that make him the ideal candidate to build upon the tremendous energy and momentum we are experiencing here on the Hilltop,” said David B. Miller, chair of SMU’s Board of Trustees and co-chair of the presidential search committee.
Hartzell has been president of UT-Austin since 2020. He previously served as dean of the McCombs School of Business and has been a UT-Austin faculty member since 2001…
Hartzell’s tenure has been marred with tense political battles on campus that pitted faculty and students against the administration. It has also been shaped by legislative efforts to implement a more conservative vision of public higher education, such as a ban on diversity, equity and inclusion offices, and attempts to end faculty tenure and limit what can be taught in college classrooms. During Hartzell’s time as president, conservative lawmakers have increasingly railed against universities that they believe have been taken over by “woke” faculty who are trying to indoctrinate students.
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As I wrote here at LI a couple of weeks ago:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/12/how-now-woke-longhorn-an-open-letter-to-university-of-texas-president-jay-hartzell/
Looks like my observations of Hartzell’s precarious position were accurate.
Hartzell alienated what should have been his base of supporters among alumni and GOP politicians by constantly kowtowing to the campus wokesters at almost every possibility. But late in the game, he also the pissed of the left by refusing to join their proposed, doomed “resistance” to the Texas anti-DEI law (SB17), and by taking action to prevent the Hamasniks from erecting an occupation on campus. (This latter event was, IMO, a forced move: had he not done so, Gov. Abbott had made it clear he’d send in the State Police.)
My inside sources at UT indicate that the regents are the agents behind Hartzell’s fall, quite likely because numerous GOP politicians have served notice that UT will be a political piñata this session, and getting rid of Hartzell makes it easy for the regents to blame him. The legislators’ wrath is due largely to Hartzell’s maladministration and unwillingness to stand up to campus wokesters when it counted.
So, adios to the Chief Woke Longhorn, and thanks to SMU for agreeing to take UT’s toxic waste off its hands.
Rest assured that the next prez will be much worse and will go scorched earth to resist any moves back to the center.
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