State of the Professor: Texas A & M Comes Out of the Closet

By Martin Snyder

Many were surprised at the university’s apparent change in policy. A & M administrations since the 1970s had resisted recognizing gay student groups and had relented only in 1985. Pressure to liberalize the university’s nondiscrimination policy began more than a decade ago, and, as recently as last summer, Bowen vetoed adding sexual orientation to the policy.

Dismissing the recommendations of the Student Senate, the Graduate Student Council, and the Faculty Senate, he argued that the university would put itself in legal jeopardy by creating special protections for gays, lesbians, bisexuals, or the transgendered. (In so arguing, the president ignored the problem-free experience of the University of Texas at Austin, which liberalized its nondiscrimination policy in 1990.)

Gay rights leaders marked the reversal of long-standing administration intransigence by issuing a press release celebrating the policy change. But at Texas A & M, apparently, no news is good news, or, to put it more accurately, even good news can be bad. Bowen did a swift about-face and withdrew the revised policy the very next day. His critics claim he was stung by press reports of socially progressive change and fearful of a backlash among alumni donors.

The university argued that the change in policy was not really a change. Gay rights leaders cried foul; the press had a field day. Three weeks later, after the university held meetings to "educate and explain to students what the new rule actually meant," the nondiscrimination policy including sexual orientation was reinstated. Texas A & M has now joined more than four hundred other colleges and universities with similar policies.

The issue raised at Texas A & M is not new to the AAUP. Its policy on discriminatory practices is clear and unequivocal. The Association’s Council adopted the following statement (revised in 1995): "The Association is committed to use its procedures and to take measures, including censure, against colleges and universities practicing illegal or unconstitutional discrimination, or discrimination on a basis not demonstrably related to the job function involved, including but not limited to age, sex, disability, race, religion, natural origin, marital status, or sexual orientation."

The AAUP has also risen to oppose such discrimination. In 1969 it placed Broward Junior College in Florida on its list of censured administrations for not renewing the contract of an art teacher who accused a county school administrator of prejudices against homosexuality. The Association successfully supported the claims of a University of Delaware drama professor whose appointment was not renewed in 1976 because of his writings about sexual orientation. In 1995 AAUP imposed censure on Nyack College in New York because the trustees refused to renew the contract of a probationary faculty member who wore a button reading "Support Gay Rights." Most recently, the 2000 annual meeting voted to impose censure on the administration of Albertus Magnus College in Connecticut for, among other causes, violating the academic freedom of an openly gay priest on leave.

The 2000 annual meeting also approved "standing" status for the formerly ad hoc Committee on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Faculty Concerns. The function of the committee is twofold: to promote equitable treatment of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender faculty within the professoriate and to advocate within the Association sustained attention to issues surrounding sexual orientation in the academy. The din at Texas A & M, though ending on a happy note, shows that the committee will have much work until academic institutions find their policies and practices in concert with the spirit of inclusion.

Martin Snyder is AAUP program director for academic freedom and professional standards.

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