Texas Tech’s College of Education offers a graduate “equity” course. It’s taught by a professor previously suspended for posting antisemitic comments on social media.
In the 2024-2025 course catalog for Texas Tech’s Education College is a class entitled “Critical Contemporary Issues in Curriculum Studies and Teacher Education.” The fall 2024 syllabus revealed more about this class.
One of the course objectives is to “embody and utilize curriculum theory toward the development of responses to issues of ethics, equity, power, and privilege in education.”
The Course
The goal of the course “is for students to relate curriculum theories as discourses of becoming, rather than being; as crystallized phenomena, rather than lenses; and as means to rethink practice towards equity in the broadest sense.”
What is curriculum theory? Scott Yenor, a senior director at the Claremont Institute’s Center for the American Way of Life—who authored a study of diversity, equity and inclusion at Texas A&M—provided some clarity.
“What they are saying here is that curriculum must not teach any substance but rather challenge dominant ideologies, and enter into a dialogue with them. So Teachers are not to teach dogmatism about being, but rather the infinite possibilities of becoming,” he stated. “They are not to reproduce the kind of society that we have, but rather enter into a dialogue about the possibilities of what we could be unburdened from what has been. Similarly, they are not to teach lenses through which to view the world, but a bunch of different ways to challenge dominant structures.”
The class schedule for this course is broken down into units. Unit II is titled “The Social, Cultural, and Racial Logics of Education.” Unit III is titled “The Intersectional.” One of the class topics was titled “Gendered, Classed, and Racial Logics of Education, Curriculum, and Pedagogy.” Assigned readings included Patricia Hill Collins’ work “Intersectionality.” Collins is a “Black feminist thought” scholar.
Google Books provided a preview of Collins’ book (2020). She and coauthor Sirma Bilge cite the address of “distinguished Marxist scholar” Michael Burawoy. “[He] argued that inequality was the most pressing issue of our time,” Collins and Bilge wrote. “Buroway suggested that growing global inequality had spurred new thinking not only in sociology but also in economics and related social sciences.”
Yenor made an observation after reading the syllabus. “Notice how the course readings are neatly divided into several identity politics concepts—race, gender, intersectionality.”
He also noted a phrase on page two of the syllabus: “Graduates in the concentration of CSTE will practice engaged scholarship …” Yenor said “[that] means scholarship that is designed to help people change the world after developing the abilities of students to critique.”
The Instructor
Jairo Funez-Flores is teaching this course. Texas Tech had previously suspended him in March 2024 for antisemitic posts on social media. Flores posted on October 7 that he’s unrepentant.
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On October 20, he wrote Israel doesn’t have “a right to exist.”
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After learning about a “Queering Agriculture” seminar on campus in June, Texas Tech leadership reiterated their position that university faculty must follow both the letter and the spirit of a 2023 state law banning DEI in higher education.
Senate Bill 17 prohibits universities from establishing a DEI office, using DEI criteria in their hiring practices, or requiring employees or prospective employees to attend DEI training. However, it does not apply to academic instruction.
Texas Scorecard asked Kamau Siwatu, the interim dean of the TTU College of Education, for comment. Matthew Dewey, vice president of marketing & communications at Texas Tech, sent the following reply:
At Texas Tech University, our course offerings are designed in full alignment with the law and uphold the principles of academic freedom protected by Senate Bill 17. We recognize that there may be potential misunderstandings regarding certain areas of the law, and we are committed to proactively addressing these concerns. We aim to ensure that our stakeholders are informed and that our commitment to transparency and all perspectives remains strong.
Texas Scorecard will continue to examine higher education in the state. If you or anyone you know has information regarding universities, please contact our tip line: scorecardtips@protonmail.com.
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